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diff --git a/11168.txt b/11168.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..7ebc532 --- /dev/null +++ b/11168.txt @@ -0,0 +1,3706 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Lives of SS. Declan and Mochuda, Anonymous + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Lives of SS. Declan and Mochuda + +Author: Anonymous + +Release Date: February 19, 2004 [EBook #11168] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LIVES OF SS. DECLAN AND MOCHUDA *** + + + + +Produced by Dennis McCarthy + + + + +IRISH TEXTS SOCIETY. + +"COMANN NA SGRIBEANN GAEDILGE." + + +Vol. XVI. +[1914.] + + + +LIFE OF ST. DECLAN OF ARDMORE, +(Edited from MS. in Bibliotheque Royale, Brussels), + +and + +LIFE OF ST. MOCHUDA OF LISMORE, +(Edited from MS. in the Library of Royal Irish Academy), + + + +With Introduction, Translation, and Notes, + + +by + +Rev. P. Power, M.R.I.A., +University College, Cork. + + + +1914. + + + + +CONTENTS. + + +Preface +Introduction + - General + - St. Declan + - St. Mochuda + - Map of Ireland +Life of Declan +Life of Mochuda +[Transcriber's Note] + + + + +PREFACE. + + +It is solely the historical aspect and worth of the two tracts herewith +presented that appealed to their edition and first suggested to him +their preparation and publication. Had preparation in question depended +for its motive merely on considerations of the texts' philologic +interest or value it would, to speak frankly, never have been +undertaken. The editor, who disclaims qualification as a philologist, +regards these Lives as very valuable historical material, publication of +which may serve to light up some dark corners of our Celtic +ecclesiastical past. He is egotist enough to hope that the present +"blazing of the track," inadequate and feeble though it be, may induce +other and better equipped explorers to follow. + +The present editor was studying the Life of Declan for quite another +purpose when, some years since, the zealous Hon. Secretary of the Irish +Texts Society suggested to him publication of the tract in its present +form, and addition of the Life of Carthach [Mochuda]. Whatever credit +therefore is due to originating this work is Miss Hull's, and hers alone. + +The editor's best thanks are due, and are hereby most gratefully +tendered, to Rev. M. Sheehan, D.D., D.Ph., Rev. Paul Walsh, Rev. J. +MacErlhean, S.J., M.A., as well as to Mr. R. O'Foley, who, at much +expense of time and labour, have carefully read the proofs, and, with +unselfish prodigality of their scholarly resources, have made many +valuable suggestions and corrections. + + P.P. + + + + +INTRODUCTION. + + +I.--GENERAL. + + +A most distinctive class of ancient Irish literature, and probably the +class that is least popularly familiar, is the hagiographical. It is, +the present writer ventures to submit, as valuable as it is distinctive +and as well worthy of study as it is neglected. While annals, tales and +poetry have found editors the Lives of Irish Saints have remained +largely a mine unworked. Into the causes of this strange neglect it is +not the purpose of the present introduction to enter. Suffice it to +glance in passing at one of the reasons which has been alleged in +explanation, scil.:--that the "Lives" are uncritical and romantic, that +they abound in wild legends, chronological impossibilities and all sorts +of incredible stories, and, finally, that miracles are multiplied till +the miraculous becomes the ordinary, and that marvels are magnified till +the narrative borders on the ludicrous. The Saint as he is sketched is +sometimes a positively repulsive being--arrogant, venomous, and cruel; +he demands two eyes or more for one, and, pucklike, fairly revels in +mischief! As painted he is in fact more a pagan deity than a Christian +man. + +The foregoing charges may, or must, be admitted partially or in full, +but such admission implies no denial of the historical value of the +Lives. All archaic literature, be it remembered, is in a greater or +less degree uncritical, and it must be read in the light of the writer's +times and surroundings. That imagination should sometimes run riot and +the pen be carried beyond the boundary line of the strictly literal is +perhaps nothing much to be marvelled at in the case of the supernatural +minded Celt with religion for his theme. Did the scribe believe what he +wrote when he recounted the multiplied marvels of his holy patron's +life? Doubtless he did--and why not! To the unsophisticated monastic +and mediaeval mind, as to the mind of primitive man, the marvellous and +supernatural is almost as real and near as the commonplace and natural. +If anyone doubts this let him study the mind of the modern Irish +peasant; let him get beneath its surface and inside its guardian ring of +shrinking reserve; there he will find the same material exactly as +composed the mind of the tenth century biographers of Declan and +Mochuda. Dreamers and visionaries were of as frequent occurrence in Erin +of ages ago as they are to-day. Then as now the supernatural and +marvellous had a wondrous fascination for the Celtic mind. Sometimes the +attraction becomes so strong as seemingly to overbalance the faculty of +distinguishing fact from fancy. Of St. Bridget we are gravely told that +to dry her wet cloak she hung in out on a sunbeam! Another Saint sailed +away to a foreign land on a sod from his native hillside! More than +once we find a flagstone turned into a raft to bear a missionary band +beyond the seas! St. Fursey exchanged diseases with his friend +Magnentius, and, stranger still, the exchange was arranged and effected +by correspondence! To the saints moreover are ascribed lives of +incredible duration--to Mochta, Ibar, Seachnal, and Brendan, for +instance, three hundred years each; St. Mochaemog is credited with a +life of four hundred and thirteen years, and so on! + +Clan, or tribe, rivalry was doubtless one of the things which made for +the invention and multiplication of miracles. If the patron of the +Decies is credited with a miracle, the tribesmen of Ossory must go one +better and attribute to their tribal saint a marvel more striking still. +The hagiographers of Decies retort for their patron by a claim of yet +another miracle and so on. It is to be feared too that occasionally a +less worthy motive than tribal honour prompted the imagination of our +Irish hagiographers--the desire to exploit the saint and his honour for +worldly gain. + +The "Lives" of the Irish Saints contain an immense quantity of material +of first rate importance for the historian of the Celtic church. +Underneath the later concoction of fable is a solid substratum of fact +which no serious student can ignore. Even where the narrative is +otherwise plainly myth or fiction it sheds many a useful sidelight on +ancient manners, customs and laws as well as on the curious and often +intricate operations of the Celtic mind. + +By "Lives" are here meant the old MS. biographies which have come down +to us from ages before the invention of printing. Sometimes these +"Lives" are styled "Acts." Generally we have only one standard "Life" +of a saint and of this there are usually several copies, scattered in +various libraries and collections. Occasionally a second Life is found +differing essentially from the first, but, as a rule, the different +copies are only recensions of a single original. Some of the MSS. are +parchment but the majority are in paper; some Lives again are merely +fragments and no doubt scores if not hundreds of others have been +entirely lost. Of many hundreds of our Irish saints we have only the +meagre details supplied by the martyrologies, with perhaps occasional +reference to them in the Lives of other saints. Again, finally, the +memory of hundreds and hundreds of saints additional survives only in +place names or is entirely lost. + +There still survive probably over a hundred "Lives"--possibly one +hundred and fifty; this, however, does not imply that therefore we have +Lives of one hundred or one hundred and fifty saints, for many of the +saints whose Acts survive have really two sets of the latter--one in +Latin and the other in Irish; moreover, of a few of the Latin Lives and +of a larger number of the Irish Lives we have two or more recensions. +There are, for instance, three independent Lives of St. Mochuda and one +of these is in two recensions. + +The surviving Lives naturally divide themselves into two great +classes--the Latin Lives and the Irish,--written in Latin and Irish +respectively. We have a Latin Life only of some saints, and Irish Life +only of others, and of others again we have a Latin Life and an Irish. +It may be necessary to add the Acts which have been translated into Latin +by Colgan or the Bollandists do not of course rank as Latin Lives. +Whether the Latin Lives proper are free translations of the Irish Lives +or the Irish Lives translations of Latin originals remains still, to a +large extent, an open question. Plummer ("Vitae SSm. Hib.," Introd.) +seems to favour the Latin Lives as the originals. His reasoning here +however leaves one rather unconvinced. This is not the place to go into +the matter at length, but a new bit of evidence which makes against the +theory of Latin originals may be quoted; it is furnished by the well +known collection of Latin Lives known as the Codex Salmanticensis, to +which are appended brief marginal notes in mixed middle Irish and Latin. +One such note to the Life of St. Cuangus of Lismore (recte Liathmore) +requests a prayer for him who has translated the Life out of the Irish +into Latin. If one of the Lives, and this a typical or characteristic +Life, be a translation, we may perhaps assume that the others, or most +of them, are translations also. In any case we may assume as certain +that there were original Irish materials or data from which the formal +Lives (Irish or Latin) were compiled. + +The Latin Lives are contained mainly in four great collections. The +first and probably the most important of these is in the Royal Library +at Brussels, included chiefly in a large MS. known as 'Codex +Salmanticensis' from the fact that it belonged in the seventeenth +century to the Irish College of Salamanca. The second collection is in +Marsh's Library, Dublin, and the third in Trinity College Library. The +two latter may for practical purposes be regarded as one, for they are +sister MSS.--copied from the same original. The Marsh's Library +collection is almost certainly, teste Plummer, the document referred to +by Colgan as Codex Kilkenniensis and it is quite certainly the Codex +Ardmachanus of Fleming. The fourth collection (or the third, if we take +as one the two last mentioned,) is in the Bodleian at Oxford amongst +what are known as the Rawlinson MSS. Of minor importance, for one +reason or another, are the collections of the Franciscan Library, +Merchants' Quay, Dublin, and in Maynooth College respectively. The +first of the enumerated collections was published 'in extenso,' about +twenty-five years since, by the Marquis of Bute, while recently the gist +of all the Latin collections has been edited with rare scholarship by +Rev. Charles Plummer of Oxford. Incidentally may be noted the one +defect in Mr. Plummer's great work--its author's almost irritating +insistence on pagan origins, nature myths, and heathen survivals. +Besides the Marquis of Bute and Plummer, Colgan and the Bollandists have +published some Latin Lives, and a few isolated "Lives" have been +published from time to time by other more or less competent editors. + +The Irish Lives, though more numerous than the Latin, are less +accessible. The chief repertorium of the former is the Burgundian or +Royal Library, Brussels. The MS. collection at Brussels appears to have +originally belonged to the Irish Franciscans of Louvain and much of it +is in the well-known handwriting of Michael O'Clery. There are also +several collections of Irish Lives in Ireland--in the Royal Irish +Academy, for instance, and Trinity College Libraries. Finally, there +are a few Irish Lives at Oxford and Cambridge, in the British Museum, +Marsh's Library, &c., and in addition there are many Lives in private +hands. In this connection it can be no harm, and may do some good, to +note that an apparently brisk, if unpatriotic, trade in Irish MSS. +(including of course "Lives" of Saints) is carried on with the United +States. Wealthy, often ignorant, Irish-Americans, who are unable to +read them, are making collections of Irish MSS. and rare Irish books, to +Ireland's loss. Some Irish MSS. too, including Lives of Saints, have +been carried away as mementoes of the old land by departing emigrants. + +The date or period at which the Lives (Latin and Irish) were written is +manifestly, for half a dozen good reasons, a question of the utmost +importance to the student of the subject. Alas, that the question has +to some extent successfully defied quite satisfactory solution. We can, +so far, only conjecture--though the probabilities seem strong and the +grounds solid. The probabilities are that the Latin Lives date as a +rule from the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, when they were put into +something like their present form for reading (perhaps in the refectory) +in the great religious houses. They were copied and re-copied during +the succeeding centuries and the scribes according to their knowledge, +devotion or caprice made various additions, subtractions and occasional +multiplications. The Irish Lives are almost certainly of a somewhat +earlier date than the Latin and are based partly (i.e. as regards the +bulk of the miracles) on local tradition, and partly (i.e. as regards +the purely historical element) on the authority of written materials. +They too were, no doubt, copied and interpolated much as were the Latin +Lives. The present copies of Irish Lives date as a rule from the +sixteenth and seventeenth centuries only, and the fact that the Latin +and the Irish Life (where there is this double biography) sometimes +agree very perfectly may indicate that the Latin translation or Life is +very late. + +The chief published collections of Irish Saints' Lives may be set down +as seven, scil.:--five in Latin and one each in Irish and English. The +Latin collections are the Bollandists', Colgan's, Messingham's, +Fleming's, and Plummer's; the Irish collection is Stokes' ("Lives of +Saints from the Book of Lismore") and the English is of course +O'Hanlon's. + +Most striking, probably, of the characteristics of the "Lives" is their +very evident effort to exalt and glorify the saint at any cost. With +this end of glorification in view the hagiographer is prepared to +swallow everything and record anything. He has, in fact, no critical +sense and possibly he would regard possession of such a sense as rather +an evil thing and use of it as irreverent. He does not, as a +consequence, succeed in presenting us with a very life-like or +convincing portrait of either the man or the saint. Indeed the saint, +as drawn in the Lives, is, as already hinted, a very unsaintlike +individual--almost as ready to curse as to pray and certainly very much +more likely to smite the aggressor than to present to him the other +cheek. In the text we shall see St. Mochuda, whose Life is a specially +sane piece of work, cursing on the same occasion, first, King Blathmac +and the Prince of Cluain, then, the rich man Cronan who sympathised with +the eviction, next an individual named Dubhsulach who winked insolently +at him, and finally the people of St. Columba's holy city of Durrow who +had stirred up hostile feeling against him. Even gentle female saints +can hurl an imprecation too. St. Laisrech, for instance, condemned the +lands of those who refused her tribute, to--nettles, elder shrub, and +corncrakes! It is pretty plain that the compilers of the lives had some +prerogatives, claims or rights to uphold--hence this frequent insistence +on the evil of resisting the Saint and presumably his successors. + +One characteristic of the Irish ascetics appears very clear through all +the exaggeration and all the biographical absurdity; it is their spirit +of intense mortification. To understand this we have only to study one +of the ancient Irish Monastic Rules or one of the Irish Penitentials as +edited by D'Achery ("Spicilegium") or Wasserschleben ("Irische +Kanonensamerlung"). Severest fasting, unquestioning obedience and +perpetual self renunciation were inculcated by the Rules and we have +ample evidence that they were observed with extraordinary fidelity. The +Rule of Maelruin absolutely forbade the use of meat or of beer. Such a +prohibition a thousand years ago was an immensely more grievous thing +than it would sound to-day. Wheaten bread might partially supply the +place of meat to-day, but meat was easier to procure than bread in the +eighth century. Again, a thousand years ago, tea or coffee there was +none and even milk was often difficult or impossible to procure in +winter. So severe in fact was the fast that religious sometimes died of +it. Bread and water being found insufficient to sustain life and health, +gruel was substituted in some monasteries and of this monastic gruel +there were three varieties:--(a) "gruel upon water" in which the liquid +was so thick that the meal reached the surface, (b) "gruel between two +waters" in which the meal, while it did not rise to the surface, did not +quite fall to the bottom, and (c) "gruel under water" which was so weak +and so badly boiled that he meal easily fell to the bottom. In the case +of penitents the first brand of gruel was prescribed for light offences, +the second kind for sins of ordinary gravity, and the "gruel under +water" for extraordinary crimes (vid. Messrs. Gwynne and Purton on the +Rule of Maelruin, &c.) The most implicit, exact and prompt obedience +was prescribed and observed. An overseer of Mochuda's monastery at +Rahen had occasion to order by name a young monk called Colman to do +something which involved his wading into a river. Instantly a dozen +Colmans plunged into the water. Instances of extraordinary penance +abound, beside which the austerities of Simon Stylites almost pale. The +Irish saints' love of solitude was also a very marked characteristic. +Desert places and solitary islands of the ocean possessed an apparently +wonderful fascination for them. The more inaccessible or forbidding the +island the more it was in request as a penitential retreat. There is +hardly one of the hundred islands around the Irish coast which, one time +or another, did not harbour some saint or solitary upon its rocky bosom. + +The testimony of the "Lives" to the saints' love and practice of prayer +is borne out by the evidence of more trustworthy documents. Besides +private prayers, the whole psalter seems to have been recited each day, +in three parts of fifty psalms each. In addition, an immense number of +Pater Nosters was prescribed. The office and prayers were generally +pretty liberally interspersed with genuflexions or prostrations, of +which a certain anchorite performed as many as seven hundred daily. +Another penitential action which accompanied prayer was the +'cros-figul.' This was an extension of the arms in the shape of a +cross; if anyone wants to know how difficult a practice this is let him +try it for, say, fifteen minutes. Regarding recitation of the Divine +Office it was of counsel, and probably of precept, that is should not be +from memory merely, but that the psalms should all be read. For this a +good reason was given by Maelruin, i.e. that the recitation might engage +the eye as well as the tongue and thought. An Irish homily refers to +the mortification of the saints and religious of the time as martyrdom, +of which it distinguishes three kinds--red, white, and blue. Red +martyrdom was death for the faith; white martyrdom was the discipline of +fasting, labour and bodily austerities; while blue martyrdom was +abnegation of the will and heartfelt sorrow for sin. + +One of the puzzles of Irish hagiology is the great age attributed to +certain saints--periods of two hundred, three hundred, and even four +hundred years. Did the original compilers of the Life intend this? +Whatever the full explanation be the writers of the Lives were clearly +animated by a desire to make their saint cotemporary and, if possible, a +disciple, of one or other of the great monastic founders, or at any rate +to prove him a pupil of one of the great schools of Erin. There was +special anxiety to connect the saint with Bangor or Clonard. To effect +the connection in question it was sometimes necessary to carry the life +backwards, at other times to carry it forwards, and occasionally to +lengthen it both backwards and forwards. Dr. Chas. O'Connor gives a +not very convincing explanation of the three-hundred-year "Lives," +scil.:--that the saint lived in three centuries--during the whole of one +century and in the end and beginning respectively of the preceding and +succeeding centuries. This explanation, even if satisfactory for the +three-hundred-year Lives, would not help at all towards the Lives of +four hundred years. A common explanation is that the scribe mistook +numerals in the MS. before him and wrote the wrong figures. There is no +doubt that copying is a fruitful source of error as regards numerals. +It is much more easy to make a mistake in a numeral than in a letter; +the context will enable one to correct the letter, while it will give +him no clue as regards a numeral. On the subject of the alleged +longevity of Irish Saints Anscombe has recently been elaborating in +'Eriu' a new and very ingenious theory. Somewhat unfortunately the +author happens to be a rather frequent propounder of ingenious theories. +His explanation is briefly--the use and confusion of different systems +of chronology. He alleges that the original writers used what is called +the Diocletian Era or the "Era of the Martyrs" as the 'terminus a quo' +of their chronological system and, in support of his position, he +adduces the fact that this, which was the most ancient of all +ecclesiastical eras, was the era used by the schismatics in Britain and +that it was introduced by St. Patrick. + +As against the contradiction, anachronisms and extravagances of the +Lives we have to put the fact that generally speaking the latter +corroborate one another, and that they receive extern corroboration from +the annals. Such disagreements as occur are only what one would expect +to find in documents dealing with times so remote. To the credit side +too must go the fact that references to Celtic geography and to local +history are all as a rule accurate. Of continental geography and +history however the writers of the Lives show much ignorance, but +scarcely quite as much as the corresponding ignorance shown by +Continental writers about Ireland. + +The missionary methods of the early Irish Church and its monastic or +semi-monastic system are frequently referred to as peculiar, if not +unique. A missionary system more or less similar must however have +prevailed generally in that age. What other system could have been +nearly as successful amongst a pagan people circumstanced as the Irish +were? The community system alone afforded the necessary mutual +encouragement and protection to the missionaries. Each monastic station +became a base of operations. The numerous diminutive dioceses, +quasi-dioceses, or tribal churches, were little more than extensive +parishes and the missionary bishops were little more in jurisdiction +than glorified parish priests. The bishop's 'muintir,' that is the +members of his household, were his assistant clergy. Having converted +the chieftain or head of the tribe the missionary had but to instruct +and baptise the tribesmen and to erect churches for them. Land and +materials for the church were provided by the Clan or the Clan's head, +and lands for support of the missioner or of the missionary community +were allotted just as they had been previously allotted to the pagan +priesthood; in fact there can be but little doubt that the lands of the +pagan priests became in many cases the endowment of the Christian +establishment. It is not necessary, by the way, to assume that the +Church in Ireland as Patrick left it, was formally monastic. The clergy +lived in community, it is true, but it was under a somewhat elastic +rule, which was really rather a series of Christian and Religious +counsels. A more formal monasticism had developed by the time of +Mochuda; this was evidently influenced by the spread of St. Benedict's +Rule, as Patrick's quasi-monasticism, nearly two centuries previously, +had been influenced by Pachomius and St. Basil, through Lerins. The +real peculiarity in Ireland was that when the community-missionary- +system was no longer necessary it was not abandoned as in other lands +but was rather developed and emphasised. + + + +II.--ST. DECLAN. + + +"If thou hast the right, O Erin, +to a champion of battle to aid thee +thou hast the head of a hundred +thousand, Declan of Ardmore." +(Martyrology of Oengus). + + +Five miles or less to the east of Youghal Harbour, on the southern +Irish coast, a short, rocky and rather elevated promontory juts, with a +south-easterly trend, into the ocean. Maps and admiralty charts call it +Ram Head, but the real name is Ceann-a-Rama and popularly it is often +styled Ardmore Head. The material of this inhospitable coast is a hard +metamorphic schist which bids defiance to time and weather. Landwards +the shore curves in clay cliffs to the north-east, leaving, between it +and the iron headland beyond, a shallow exposed bay wherein many a proud +ship has met her doom. Nestling at the north side of the headland and +sheltered by the latter from Atlantic storms stands one of the most +remarkable groups of ancient ecclesiastical remains in Ireland--all that +has survived of St. Declan's holy city of Ardmore. This embraces a +beautiful and perfect round tower, a singularly interesting ruined church +commonly called the cathedral, the ruins of a second church beside a holy +well, a primitive oratory, a couple of ogham inscribed pillar stones, +&c., &c. + +No Irish saint perhaps has so strong a local hold as Declan or has left +so abiding a popular memory. Nevertheless his period is one of the great +disputed questions of early Irish history. According to the express +testimony of his Life, corroborated by testimony of the Lives of SS. +Ailbhe and Ciaran, he preceded St. Patrick in the Irish mission and was a +co-temporary of the national apostle. Objection, exception or opposition +to the theory of Declan's early period is based less on any inherent +improbability in the theory itself than on contradictions and +inconsistencies in the Life. Beyond any doubt the Life does actually +contradict itself; it makes Declan a cotemporary of Patrick in the fifth +century and a cotemporary likewise of St. David a century later. In any +attempted solution of the difficulty involved it may be helpful to +remember a special motive likely to animate a tribal histrographer, +scil.:--the family relationship, if we may so call it, of the two saints; +David was bishop of the Deisi colony in Wales as Declan was bishop of +their kinsmen of southern Ireland. It was very probably part of the +writer's purpose to call attention to the links of kindred which bound +the separated Deisi; witness his allusion later to the alleged visit of +Declan to his kinsmen of Bregia. Possibly there were several Declans, as +there were scores of Colmans, Finians, &c., and hence perhaps the +confusion and some of the apparent inconsistencies. There was certainly +a second Declan, a disciple of St. Virgilius, to whom the latter +committed care of a church in Austria where he died towards close of +eighth century. Again we find mention of a St. Declan who was a foster +son of Mogue of Ferns, and so on. It is too much, as Delehaye ("Legendes +Hagiographiques") remarks, to expect the populace to distinguish between +namesakes. Great men are so rare! Is it likely there should have lived +two saints of the same name in the same country! + +The latest commentators on the question of St. Declan's period--and they +happen to be amongst the most weighty--argue strongly in favour of the +pre-Patrician mission (Cfr. Prof. Kuno Meyer, "Learning Ireland in the +Fifth Century"). Discussing the way in which letters first reached our +distant island of the west and the causes which led to the proficiency of +sixth-century Ireland in classical learning Zimmer and Meyer contend that +the seeds of that literary culture, which flourished in Ireland of the +sixth century, had been sown therein in the first and second decades of +the preceding century by Gaulish scholars who had fled from their own +country owing to invasion of the latter by Goths and other barbarians. +The fact that these scholars, who were mostly Christians, sought asylum +in Ireland indicates that Christianity had already penetrated thither, or +at any rate that it was known and tolerated there. Dr. Meyer answers the +objection that if so large and so important an invasion of scholars took +place we ought have some reference to the fact in the Irish annals. The +annals, he replies, are of local origin and they rarely refer in their +oldest parts to national events: moreover they are very meagre in their +information about the fifth century. One Irish reference to the Gaulish +scholars is, however, adduced in corroboration; it occurs in that well +known passage in St. Patrick's "Confessio" where the saint cries out +against certain "rhetoricians" in Ireland who were hostile to him and +pagan,--"You rhetoricians who do not know the Lord, hear and search Who +it was that called me up, fool though I be, from the midst of those who +think themselves wise and skilled in the law and mighty orators and +powerful in everything." Who were these "rhetorici" that have made this +passage so difficult for commentators and have caused so various +constructions to be put upon it? It is clear, the professor maintains, +that the reference is to pagan rhetors from Gaul whose arrogant +presumption, founded on their learning, made them regard with disdain the +comparatively illiterate apostle of the Scots. Everyone is familiar with +the classic passage of Tacitus wherein he alludes to the harbours of +Ireland as being more familiar to continental mariners than those of +Britain. We have references moreover to refugee Christians who fled to +Ireland from the persecutions of Diocletian more than a century before +St. Patrick's day; in addition it is abundantly evident that many +Irishmen--Christians like Celestius the lieutenant of Pelagius, and +possibly Pelagius himself, amongst them--had risen to distinction or +notoriety abroad before middle of the fifth century. + +Possibly the best way to present the question of Declan's age is to put +in tabulated form the arguments of the pre-Patrician advocates against +the counter contentions of those who claim that Declan's period is later +than Patrick's:-- + + For the Pre-Patrician Mission. +I.--Positive statement of Life, corroborated by Lives of SS. Ciaran and +Ailbhe. +II.--Patrick's apparent avoidance of the Principality of Decies. +III.--The peculiar Declan cult and the strong local hold which Declan has +maintained. + + Against Theory of Early Fifth Century period. +I.--Contradictions, anachronisms, &c., of Life. +II.--Lack of allusion to Declan in the Lives of St. Patrick. +III.--Prosper's testimony to the mission of Palladius as first bishop to +the believing Scots. +IV.--Alleged motives for later invention of Pre-Patrician story. + +In this matter and at this hour it is hardly worth appealing to the +authority of Lanigan and the scholars of the past. Much evidence not +available in Lanigan's day is now at the service of scholars. We are to +look rather at the reasoning of Colgan, Ussher, and Lanigan than to the +mere weight of their names. + +Referring in order to our tabulated grounds of argument, pro and con, and +taking the pro arguments first, we may (I.) discard as evidence for our +purpose the Life of St. Ibar which is very fragmentary and otherwise a +rather unsatisfactory document. The Lives of Ailbhe, Ciaran, and Declan +are however mutually corroborative and consistent. The Roman visit and +the alleged tutelage under Hilarius are probably embellishments; they +look like inventions to explain something and they may contain more than +a kernel of truth. At any rate they are matters requiring further +investigation and elucidation. In this connection it may be useful to +recall that the Life (Latin) of St. Ciaran has been attributed by Colgan +to Evinus the disciple and panegyrist of St. Patrick. + +Patrick's apparent neglect of the Decies (II.) may have no special +significance. At best it is but negative evidence: taken, however, in +connection with (I.) and its consectaria it is suggestive. We can +hardly help speculating why the apostle--passing as it were by its front +door--should have given the go-bye to a region so important as the +Munster Decies. Perhaps he sent preachers into it; perhaps there was no +special necessity for a formal mission, as the faith had already found +entrance. It is a little noteworthy too that we do not find St. +Patrick's name surviving in any ecclesiastical connection with the +Decies, if we except Patrick's Well, near Clonmel, and this Well is +within a mile or so of the territorial frontier. Moreover the southern +portion of the present Tipperary County had been ceded by Aengus to the +Deisi, only just previous to Patrick's advent, and had hardly yet had +sufficient time to become absorbed. The whole story of Declan's alleged +relations with Patrick undoubtedly suggests some irregularity in Declan's +mission--an irregularity which was capable of rectification through +Patrick and which de facto was finally so rectified. + +(III.) No one in Eastern Munster requires to be told how strong is the +cult of St. Declan throughout Decies and the adjacent territory. It is +hardly too much to say that the Declan tradition in Waterford and Cork is +a spiritual actuality, extraordinary and unique, even in a land which +till recently paid special popular honour to its local saints. In +traditional popular regard Declan in the Decies has ever stood first, +foremost, and pioneer. Carthage, founder of the tribal see, has held and +holds in the imagination of the people only a secondary place. Declan, +whencesoever or whenever he came, is regarded as the spiritual father to +whom the Deisi owe the gift of faith. How far this tradition and the +implied belief in Declan's priority and independent mission are derived +from circulation of the "Life" throughout Munster in the last few +centuries it is difficult to gauge, but the tradition seems to have +flourished as vigorously in the days of Colgan as it does to-day. +Declan's "pattern" at Ardmore continues to be still the most noted +celebration of its kind in Ireland. A few years ago it was participated +in by as many as fourteen thousand people from all parts of Waterford, +Cork, and Tipperary. The scenes and ceremonies have been so frequently +described that it is not necessary to recount them here--suffice it to +say that the devotional practices and, in fact, the whole celebration is +of a purely popular character receiving no approbation, and but bare +toleration, from church or clergy. Even to the present day Declan's name +is borne as their praenomen by hundreds of Waterford men, and, before +introduction of the modern practice of christening with foolish foreign +names, its use was far more common, as the ancient baptismal registers of +Ardmore, Old Parish, and Clashmore attest. On the other hand Declan's +name is associated with comparatively few places in the Decies. Of these +the best known is Relig Deaglain, a disused graveyard and early church +site on the townland of Drumroe, near Cappoquin. There was also an +ancient church called Killdeglain, near Stradbally. + +Against the theory of the pre-Patrician or citra-Patrician mission we +have first the objection, which really has no weight, and which we shall +not stop to discuss, that it is impossible for Christianity at that early +date to have found its way to this distant island, beyond the boundary of +the world. An argument on a different plane is (I.), the undoubtedly +contradictory and inconsistent character of the Life. It is easy however +to exaggerate the importance of this point. Modern critical methods were +undreamed of in the days of our hagiographer, who wrote, moreover, for +edification only in a credulous age. Most of the historical documents of +the period are in a greater or less degree uncritical but that does not +discredit their testimony however much it may confuse their editors. It +can be urged moreover that two mutually incompatible genealogies of the +saint are given. The genealogy given by MacFirbisigh seems in fact to +disagree in almost every possible detail with the genealogy in 23 M. 50 +R.I.A. That however is like an argument that Declan never existed. It +really suggests and almost postulates the existence of a second Declan +whose Acts and those of our Declan have become mutually confused. + +(II.) Absence of Declan's name from the Acts of Patrick is a negative +argument. It is explicable perhaps by the supposed irregularity of +Declan's preaching. Declan was certainly earlier than Mochuda and yet +there is no reference to him in the Life of the latter saint. Ailbhe +however is referred to in the Tripartite Life of Patrick and the cases of +Ailbhe and Declan are "a pari"; the two saints stand or fall together. + +(IV.) Motives for invention of the pre-Patrician myth are alleged, +scil.:--to rebut certain claims to jurisdiction, tribute or visitation +advanced by Armagh in after ages. It is hard to see however how +resistance to the claims in question could be better justified on the +theory of a pre-Patrician Declan, who admittedly acknowledged Patrick's +supremacy, than on the admission of a post-Patrician mission. + +That in Declan we have to deal with a very early Christian teacher of the +Decies there can be no doubt. If not anterior to Patrick he must have +been the latter's cotemporary. Declan however had failed to convert the +chieftain of his race and for this--reading between the lines of the +"Life"--we seem to hear Patrick blaming him. + +The monuments proper of Declan remaining at Ardmore are (a) his oratory +near the Cathedral and Round Tower in the graveyard, (b) his stone on the +beach, (c) his well on the cliff, and (d) another stone said to have been +found in his tomb and preserved at Ardmore for long ages with great +reveration. The "Life" refers moreover to the saint's pastoral staff and +his bell but these have disappeared for centuries. + +The "Oratory" is simply a primitive church of the usual sixth century +type: it stands 13' 4" x 8' 9" in the clear, and has, or had, the usual +high-pitched gables and square-headed west doorway with inclining jambs. +Another characteristic feature of the early oratory is seen in the +curious antae or prolongation of the side walls. Locally the little +building is known as the "beannacan," in allusion, most likely, to its +high gables or the finials which once, no doubt, in Irish fashion, +adorned its roof. Though somewhat later than Declan's time this +primitive building is very intimately connected with the Saint. +Popularly it is supposed to be his grave and within it is a hollow space +scooped out, wherein it is said his ashes once reposed. It is highly +probable that tradition is quite correct as to the saint's grave, over +which the little church was erected in the century following Declan's +death. The oratory was furnished with a roof of slate by Bishop Mills in +1716. + +"St. Declan's Stone" is a glacial boulder of very hard conglomerate which +lies on a rocky ledge of beach beneath the village of Ardmore. It +measures some 8' 6" x 4' 6" x 4' 0" and reposes upon two slightly jutting +points of the underlying metamorphic rock. Wonderful virtues are +attributed to St. Declan's Stone, which, on the occasion of the patronal +feast, is visited by hundreds of devotees who, to participate in its +healing efficacy and beneficence, crawl laboriously on face and hands +through the narrow space between the boulder and the underlying rock. +Near by, at foot of a new storm-wall, are two similar but somewhat +smaller boulders which, like their venerated and more famous neighbour, +were all wrenched originally by a glacier from their home in the Comeragh +Mountains twenty miles away. + +"St. Declan's Well," beside some remains of a rather large and apparently +twelfth century church on the cliff, in the townland of Dysert is +diverted into a shallow basin in which pilgrims bathe feet and hands. +Set in some comparatively modern masonry over the well are a carved +crucifixion and other figures of apparently late mediaeval character. +Some malicious interference with this well led, nearly a hundred years +since, to much popular indignation and excitement. + +The second "St. Declan's Stone" was a small, cross-inscribed jet-black +piece of slate or marble, approximately--2" or 3" x 1 1/2". Formerly it +seems to have had a small silver cross inset and was in great demand +locally as an amulet for cattle curing. It disappeared however, some +fifty years or so since, but very probably it could still be recovered in +Dungarvan. + +Far the most striking of all the monuments at Ardmore is, of course, the +Round Tower which, in an excellent state of preservation, stands with its +conical cap of stone nearly a hundred feet high. Two remarkable, if not +unique, features of the tower are the series of sculptured corbels which +project between the floors on the inside, and the four projecting belts +or zones of masonry which divide the tower into storeys externally. The +tower's architectural anomalies are paralleled by its history which is +correspondingly unique: it stood a regular siege in 1642, when ordnance +was brought to bear on it and it was defended by forty confederates +against the English under Lords Dungarvan and Broghil. + +A few yards to north of the Round Tower stands "The Cathedral" +illustrating almost every phase of ecclesiastical architecture which +flourished in Ireland from St. Patrick to the Reformation--Cyclopean, +Celtic-Romanesque, Transitional and Pointed. The chancel arch is +possibly the most remarkable and beautiful illustration of the +Transitional that we have. An extraordinary feature of the church is the +wonderful series of Celtic arcades and panels filled with archaic +sculptures in relief which occupy the whole external face of the west +gable. + +St. Declan's foundation at Ardmore seems (teste Moran's Archdall) to have +been one of the Irish religious houses which accepted the reform of Pope +Innocent at the Lateran Council and to have transformed itself into a +Regular Canonry. It would however be possible to hold, on the evidence, +that it degenerated into a mere parochial church. We hear indeed of two +or three episcopal successors of the saint, scil.:--Ultan who immediately +followed him, Eugene who witnessed a charter to the abbey of Cork in +1174, and Moelettrim O Duibhe-rathre who died in 1303 after he had, +according to the annals of Inisfallen, "erected and finished the Church" +of Ardmore. The "Wars of the Gaedhil and Gall" have reference, circa 824 +or 825, to plunder by the Northmen of Disert Tipraite which is almost +certainly the church of Dysert by the Holy Well at Ardmore. The same +fleet, on the same expedition, plundered Dunderrow (near Kinsale), +Inisshannon (Bandon River), Lismore, and Kilmolash. + +Regarding the age of our "Life" it is difficult with the data at hand to +say anything very definite. While dogmatism however is dangerous +indefiniteness is unsatisfying. True, we cannot trace the genealogy of +the present version beyond middle of the sixteenth century, but its +references to ancient monuments existing at date of its compilation show +it to be many centuries older. Its language proves little or nothing, +for, being a popular work, it would be modernised to date by each +successive scribe. Colgan was of opinion it was a composition of the +eighth century. Ussher and Ware, who had the Life in very ancient +codices, also thought it of great antiquity. Papebrach, the Bollandist, +on the other hand, considered the Life could not be older than the +twelfth century, but this opinion of his seems to have been based on a +misapprehension. In the absence of all diocesan colour or allusion one +feels constrained to assign the production to some period previous to +Rathbreasail. We should not perhaps be far wrong in assigning the first +collection of materials to somewhere in the eighth century or in the +century succeeding. The very vigorous ecclesiastical revival of the +eleventh century, at conclusion of the Danish wars, must have led to some +revision of the country's religious literature. The introduction, a +century and-a-half later, of the great religious orders most probably led +to translation of the Life into Latin and its casting into shape for +reading in refectory or choir. + +Only three surviving copies of the Irish Life are known to the writer: +one in the Royal Library at Brussels, the second in the Royal Irish +Academy Collection (M. 23, 50, pp. 109-120), and the third in possession +of Professor Hyde. As the second and third enumerated are copies of one +imperfect exemplar it has not been thought necessary to collate both with +the Brussels MS. which has furnished the text here printed. M. 23, 50 +(R.I.A.) has however been so collated and the marginal references +initialled B are to that imperfect copy. The latter, by the way, is in +the handwriting of John Murphy "na Raheenach," and is dated 1740. It has +not been thought necessary to give more than the important variants. + +The present text is a reproduction of the Brussels MS. plus lengthening +of contractions. As regards lengthening in question it is to be noted +that the well known contraction for "ea" or "e" has been uniformly +transliterated "e." Otherwise orthography of the MS. has been +scrupulously followed--even where inconsistent or incorrect. For the +division into paragraphs the editor is not responsible; he has merely +followed the division originated, or adopted, by the scribe. The Life +herewith presented was copied in 1629 by Brother Michael O'Clery of the +Four Masters' staff from an older MS. of Eochy O'Heffernan's dated 1582. +The MS. of O'Heffernan is referred to by our scribe as "seinleabar," but +his reference is rather to the contents than to the copy. Apparently +O'Clery did more than transcribe; he re-edited, as was his wont, into the +literary Irish of his day. A page of the Brussels MS., reproduced in +facsimile as a frontispiece to the present volume, will give the student +a good idea of O'Clery's script and style. + +Occasional notes on Declan in the martyrologies and elsewhere give some +further information about our saint. Unfortunately however the alleged +facts are not always capable of reconciliation with statements of our +"Life," and again the existence of a second, otherwise unknown, Declan is +suggested. The introduction of rye is attributed to him in the Calendar +of Oengus, as introduction of wheat is credited to St. Finan Camm, and +introduction of bees to St. Modomnoc,--"It was the full of his shoe that +Declan brought, the full of his shoe likewise Finan, but the full of his +bell Modomnoc" (Cal. Oeng., April 7th). More puzzling is the note in the +same Calendar which makes Declan a foster son of Mogue of Ferns! This +entry illustrates the way in which errors originate. A former scribe +inadvertently copied in, after Declan's name, portion of the entry +immediately following which relates to Colman Hua Liathain. Successive +scribes re-copied the error without discovering it and so it became +stereotyped. + + + +III.--ST. MOCHUDA. + + +"It was he (Mochuda) that had the famous congregation +consisting of seven hundred and ten persons; an angel +used to address every third man of them." +(Martyrology of Donegal). + + +In some respects the Life of Mochuda here presented is in sharp contrast +to the corresponding Life of Declan. The former document is in all +essentials a very sober historical narrative--accurate wherever we can +test it, credible and harmonious on the whole. Philologically, to be +sure, it is of little value,--certainly a much less valuable Life than +Declan's; historically, however (and question of the pre-Patrician +mission apart) it is immensely the more important document. On one +point do we feel inclined to quarrel with its author, scil.: that he +has not given us more specifically the motives underlying Mochuda's +expulsion from Rahen--one of the three worst counsels ever given in +Erin. Reading between his lines we spell, jealousy--'invidia +religiosorum.' Another jealousy too is suggested--the mutual distrust +of north and south which has been the canker-worm of Irish political +life for fifteen hundred years, making intelligible if not justifying +the indignation of a certain distinguished Irishman who wanted to know +the man's name, in order to curse its owner, who first divided Ireland +into two provinces. + +Three different Lives of Mochuda are known to the present writer. Two of +them are contained in a MS. at Brussels (C/r. Bindon, p. 8, 13) and of +one of these there is a copy in a MS. of Dineen's in the Royal Irish +Academy (Stowe Collection, A. IV, I.) Dineen appears to have been a +Cork or Kerry man and to have worked under the patronage of the rather +noted Franciscan Father Francis Matthew (O'Mahony), who was put to death +at Cork by Inchiquin in 1644. The bald text of Dineen's "Life" was +published a few years since, without translation, in the 'Irish Rosary.' +The corresponding Brussels copy is in Michael O'Clery's familiar hand. +In it occurs the strange pagan-flavoured story of the British Monk +Constantine. O'Clery's copy was made in January, 1627, at the Friary of +Drouish from the Book of Tadhg O'Ceanan and it is immediately followed +by a tract entitled--"Do Macaib Ua Suanac." The bell of Mochuda, by the +way, which the saint rang against Blathmac, was called the 'glassan' of +Hui Suanaig in later times. + +The "Life" here printed, which follows the Latin Life so closely that +one seems a late translation of the other, is as far as the editor is +aware, contained in a single MS. only. This is M. 23, 50, R.I.A., in +the handwriting of John Murphy, "na Raheenach." Murphy was a Co. Cork +schoolmaster, scribe, and poet, of whom a biographical sketch will be +found prefixed by Mr. R. A. Foley to a collection of Murphy's poems that +he has edited. The sobriquet, "na Raheenach," is really a kind of +tribal designation. The "Life" is very full but is in its present form +a comparatively late production; it was transcribed by Murphy between +1740 and 1750. It is much to be regretted that the scribe tells us +nothing of his original. Murphy, but the way, seems to have specialised +to some extent in saint's Lives and to have imbued his disciples with +something of the same taste. One of his pupils was Maurice O'Connor, a +scribe and shipwright of Cove, to whom we owe the Life of St. Ciaran of +Saighir printed in "Silva Gadelica." The reasons of choice for +publication here of the present Life are avowedly non-philological; the +motive for preference is that it is the longest of the three Lives and +for historical purposes the most important. + +The Life presents considerable evidence of historical reliability; its +geography is detailed and correct; its references to contemporaries +of Mochuda are accurate on the whole and there are few inconsistencies +or none. Moreover it sheds some new light on that chronic +puzzle--organisation of the Celtic Church of Ireland. Mochuda, head of a +great monastery at Rahen, is likewise a kind of pluralist Parish Priest +with a parish in Kerry, administered in his name by deputed +ecclesiastics, and other parishes similarly administered in Kerrycurrihy, +Rostellan, West Muskerry, and Spike Island, Co. Cork. When a chief +parishioner lies seriously ill in distant Corca Duibhne, Mochuda himself +comes all the way from the centre of Ireland to administer the last rites +to the dying man, and so on. + +The relations of the people to the Church and its ministers are in many +respects not at all easy to understand. Oblations, for instance, of +themselves and their territory, &c., by chieftains are frequent. +Oblations of monasteries are made in a similar way. Probably this +signifies no more than that the chief region or monastery put itself +under the saint's jurisdiction or rule or both. That there were other +churches too than the purely monastic appears from offerings to Mochuda +of already existing churches, v.g. from the Clanna Ruadhan in Decies, +&c. + +Lismore, the most famous of Mochuda's foundations, became within a +century of the saint's death, one of the great monastic schools of Erin, +attracting to his halls, or rather to its boothies, students from all +Ireland and even--so it is claimed--from lands beyond the seas. King +Alfrid [Aldfrith] of Northumbria, for instance, is said to have partaken +of Lismore's hospitality, and certainly Cormac of Cashel, Malachy and +Celsus of Armagh and many others of the most distinguished of the Scots +partook thereof. The roll of Lismore's calendared saints would require, +did the matter fall within our immediate province, more than one page to +itself. Some interesting reference to Mochuda and his holy city occur +in the Life of one of his disciples, St. Colman Maic Luachain, edited +for the R.I.A. by Professor Kuno Meyer. + +There are many indications in the present Life that, at one period, and +in the time of Carthach, the western boundary of Decies extended far +beyond the line at present recognised. Similar indications are furnished +by the martyrologies, &c.; for instance, the martyrology of Donegal +under November 28th records of "the three sons of Bochra" that "they are +of Archadh Raithin in Ui Mic Caille in Deisi Mumhan" and Ibid, p. +xxxvii, it is stated "i ccondae Corcaige ataid na Desi Muman." Not only +Imokilly but all Co. Cork, east of Queenstown [Cobh] and north to the +Blackwater, seems to have acknowledged Mochuda's jurisdiction. At +Rathbreasail accordingly (teste Keating, on the authority of the Book of +Cloneneigh) the Diocese of Lismore is made to extend to Cork,--probably +over the present baronies of Imokilly, Kinatallon, and Barrymore. That +part, at least, of Condons and Clangibbon was likewise included is +inferrible from the fact that, as late as the sixteenth century +visitations, Kilworth, founded by Colman Maic Luachain, ranked as a +parish in the diocese of Lismore. Further evidence pointing in the same +direction is furnished by Clondulane, &c., represented in the present +Life as within Carthach's jurisdiction. + +The Rule of St. Carthach is one of the few ancient Irish so-called +monastic Rules surviving. It is in reality less a "rule," as the latter +is now understood, than a series of Christian and religious counsels +drawn up by a spiritual master for his disciples. It must not be +understood from this that each religious house did not have it formal +regulations. The latter however seem to have depended largely upon the +abbot's spirit, will or discretion. The existing "Rules" abound in +allusions to forgotten practices and customs and, to add to their +obscurity, their language is very difficult--sometimes, like the +language of the Brehon Laws, unintelligible. The rule ascribed to +Mochuda is certainly a document of great antiquity and may well have +emanated from the seventh century and from the author whose name it +bears. The tradition of Lismore and indeed of the Irish Church is +constant in attributing it to him. Copies of the Rule are found in +numerous MSS. but many of them are worthless owing to the incompetence +of the scribes to whom the difficult Irish of the text was +unintelligible. The text in the Leabhar Breac has been made the basis +of his edition of the Rule by Mac Eaglaise, a writer in the 'Irish +Ecclesiastical Record' (1910). Mac Eaglaise's edition, though it is not +all that could be desired, is far the most satisfactory which has yet +appeared. Previous editions of the Rule or part of it comprise one by +Dr. Reeves in his tract on the Culdees, one by Kuno Meyer in the 'Gaelic +Journal' (Vol. V.) and another in 'Archiv fuer C.L.' (3 Bund. 1905), and +another again in 'Eriu' (Vol. 2, p. 172), besides a free translation of +the whole rule by O'Curry in the 'I. R. Record' for 1864. The text of +the 'Record' edition of 1910 is from Leabhar Breac collated with other +MSS. The order in the various copies is not the same and some copies +contain material which is wanting in others. The "Rule" commences with +the Ten Commandments, then it enumerates the obligations respectively of +bishops, abbots, priests, monks, and culdees [anchorites]. Finally there +is a section on the order of meals and on the refectory and another on +the obligations of a king. The following excerpt on the duties of an +abbot ('I. E. Record' translation) will illustrate the style and spirit +of the Rule: + + "Of the Abbot of a Church. +1.--If you be the head man of a Church noble is the power, better for you +that you be just who take the heirship of the king. +2.--If you are the head man of a Church noble is the obligation, +preservation of the rights of the Church from the small to the great. +3.--What Holy Church commands preach then with diligence; what you order +to each one do it yourself. +4.--As you love your own soul love the souls of all. Yours the +magnification of every good [and] banishment of every evil. +5.--Be not a candle under a bushel [Luke 11:33]. Your learning without a +cloud over it. Yours the healing of every host both strong and weak. +6.--Yours to judge each one according to grade and according to deed; he +will advise you at judgment before the king.... +10.--Yours to rebuke the foolish, to punish the hosts, turning disorder +into order [restraint] of the stubborn, obstinate, wretched." + +Reservation of the Coarbship of Mochuda at Lismore in favour of Kerrymen +is an extremely curious if not unique provision. How long it continued +in force we do not know. Probably it endured to the twelfth century and +possibly the rule was not of strict interpretation. Christian +O'Connarchy, who was bishop of Lismore in the twelfth century, is +regarded as a native of Decies, though the contrary is slightly +suggested by his final retirement to Kerry. The alleged prophecy +concerning Kerry men and the coarbship points to some rule, regulation +or law of Mochuda. + + + +MAP OF IRELAND. + + ++-------------------------------------------+ +| | +| __ __---_ | +| ,-~~~ ~\/ ~\ | +| ,_/ | | +| /,_ / | +| _ _/ ~\ | +| /~~ ~\/~-_| / | +| \ /~ | +| \ _ _\/ | +| ,' | | +| /~ Tara \ | +| \ * | | +| '~|__- Rahen / | +| .- ,/~ * \ | +| | / | +| / | | +| /_,_/~ | | +| / Cashel / | +| ,--~ * | | +| /--- Lismore __|_-_/ | +| ,-~ *-,-~ | +| \_-~/ \ /~ * | +| ,-~/= _/~ Ardmore | +| --~/_-_-/~'~ | +| | ++-------------------------------------------+ + + + + +LIFE OF ST. DECLAN. + +"BETHA DECCLAIN." + + +1. The most blessed Bishop Declan of the most noble race of the kings of +Ireland, i.e., the holy bishop who is called Declan was of the most noble +royal family of Ireland--a family which held the sceptre and exacted +tribute from all Ireland at Tara for ages. Declan was by birth of noble +blood as will appear from his origin and genealogy, for it was from +Eochaidh Feidhleach, the powerful Ardrigh of Ireland for twelve years, +that he sprang. Eochaidh aforesaid, had three sons, scil.:--Breas, Nar, +and Lothola, who are called the three Finneavna; there reigned one +hundred and seven kings of their race and kindred before and after them, +i.e. of the race of Eremon, king of Ireland,--before the introduction of +Christianity and since. These three youths lay one day with their own +sister Clothra, daughter of the same father, and she conceived of them. +The son she brought forth as a consequence of that intercourse was marked +by three red wavy lines which indicated his descent from the three youths +aforesaid. He was named Lugaidh Sriabhdearg from the three lines +[sriabaib] in question, and he was beautiful to behold and of greater +bodily strength in infancy than is usual with children of his age. He +commenced his reign as king of Ireland the year in which Caius Caesar +[Caligula] died and he reigned for twenty-six years. His son was named +Criomthan Nianair who reigned but sixteen years. Criomthan's son was +named Fearadach Finnfechtnach whose son was Fiacha Finnolaidh whose son +again was Tuathal Teachtmhar. This Tuathal had a son Felimidh Reachtmhar +who had in turn three sons--Conn Ceadcathach, Eochaidh Finn, and Fiacha +Suighde. Conn was king of Ireland for twenty years and the +productiveness of crops and soil and of dairies in the time of Conn are +worthy of commemoration and of fame to the end of time. Conn was killed +in Magh Cobha by the Ulstermen, scil.:--by Tiopruid Tireach and it is +principally his seed which has held the kingship of Ireland ever since. +Eochaidh Finn was second son to Felimidh Reachtmhar and he migrated to +the latter's province of Leinster, and it is in that province his race +and progeny have remained since then. They are called Leinstermen, and +there are many chieftains and powerful persons of them in Leinster. +Fiacha Suighde moreover, although he died before he succeeded to the +chief sovereignty, possessed land around Tara. He left three sons--Ross, +Oengus, and Eoghan who were renowned for martial deeds--valiant and +heroic in battle and in conflict. Of the three, Oengus excelled in all +gallant deeds so that he came to be styled Oengus of the poisonous +javelin. Cormac Mac Art Mac Conn it was who reigned in Ireland at this +time. Cormac had a son named Ceallach who took by force the daughter of +Eoghan Mac Fiacha Suighde to dwell with him, i.e. Credhe the daughter of +Eoghan. When Oengus Gaebuaibhtheach ("of the poisonous javelin") heard +this, viz., that the daughter of his brother had been abducted by +Ceallach he was roused to fury and he followed Ceallach to Tara taking +with him his foster child, scil.:--Corc Duibhne, the son of Cairbre, son +of Conaire, son of Mogha Lamha whom Cormac held as a hostage from the +Munstermen, and whom he had given for safe custody to Oengus. When +Oengus reached Tara he beheld Ceallach sitting behind Cormac. He thrust +his spear at Ceallach and pierced him through from front to back. +However as he was withdrawing the spear the handle struck Cormac's eye +and knocked it out and then, striking the steward, killed him. He +himself (Oengus) with his foster child escaped safely. After a time +Cormac, grieving for the loss of his son, his eye and his steward at the +hands of Oengus of the poisonous javelin and of his kinsmen, ordered +their expulsion from their tribal territory, i.e. from the Decies of +Tara, and not alone from these, but from whole northern half of Ireland. +However, seven battles were fought in which tremendous loss was inflicted +on Cormac and his followers before Oengus and his people, i.e. the three +sons of Fiacha Suighde, namely, Ross and Oengus and Eoghan, as we have +already said, were eventually defeated, and obliged to fly the country +and to suffer exile. Consequent on their banishment as above by the king +of Ireland they sought hospitality from the king of Munster, Oilill Olum, +because Sadhbh, daughter of Conn Ceadcathach was his wife. They got land +from him, scil.: the Decies of Munster, and it is to that race, i.e. the +race of Eoghan Mac Fiacha Suighde that the kings and country of the +Decies belong ever since. + +2. Of this same race of Eoghan was the holy bishop Declan of whom I +shall speak later scil.: Declan son of Eirc, son of Trein, son of +Lughaidh, son of Miaich, son of Brian, son of Eoghan, son of Art Corp, +son of Moscorb, son of Mesgeadra, son of Measfore, son of Cuana +Cainbhreathaigh, son of Conaire Cathbuadhaigh, son of Cairbre, son of +Eoghan, son of Fiacha Suighde, son of Felimidh Reachtmhar, son of Tuathal +Teachtmhar. The father of Declan was therefore Erc Mac Trein. He and +his wife Deithin went on a visit to the house of his kinsman Dobhran +about the time that Declan's birth was due. The child she bore was +Declan, whom she brought forth without sickness, pain or difficulty but +in being lifted up afterwards he struck his head against a great stone. +Let it be mentioned that Declan showed proofs of sanctification and power +of miracle-working in his mother's womb, as the prophet writes:--"De +vulva sanctificavi te et prophetam in gentibus dedi te" [Jeremias 1:5] +(Before thou camest forth out of the womb I sanctified thee and made thee +a prophet unto the nations). Thus it is that Declan was sanctified in +his mother's womb and was given by God as a prophet to the pagans for the +conversion of multitudes of them from heathenism and the misery of +unbelief to the worship of Christ and to the Catholic faith, as we shall +see later on. The very soft apex of his head struck against a hard +stone, as we have said, and where the head came in contact with the stone +it made therein a hollow and cavity of its own form and shape, without +injury of any kind to him. Great wonder thereupon seized all who +witnessed this, for Ireland was at this time without the true faith and +it was rarely that any one (therein) had shown heavenly Christian signs. +"Declan's Rock" is the name of the stone with which the Saint's head came +into contact. The water or rain which falls into the before-mentioned +cavity (the place of Declan's head) dispels sickness and infirmity, by +the grace of God, as proof of Declan's sanctity. + +3. On the night of Declan's birth a wondrous sign was revealed to all, +that is to the people who were in the neighbourhood of the birthplace; +this was a ball of fire which was seen blazing on summit of the house in +which the child lay, until it reached up to heaven and down again, and it +was surrounded by a multitude of angels. It assumed the shape of a +ladder such as the Patriarch, Jacob saw [Genesis 28:12]. The persons who +saw and heard these things wondered at them. They did not know (for the +true faith had not yet been preached to them or in this region) that it +was God who (thus) manifested His wondrous power (works) in the infant, +His chosen child. Upon the foregoing manifestation a certain true +Christian, scil.:--Colman, at that time a priest and afterwards a holy +bishop, came, rejoicing greatly and filled with the spirit of prophecy, +to the place where Declan was; he preached the faith of Christ to the +parents and made known to them that the child was full of the grace of +God. He moreover revealed to them the height of glory and honour to +which the infant should attain before God and men, and it was revealed to +him that he (Declan) should spend his life in sanctity and devotion. +Through the grace of God, these, i.e. Erc and Deithin, believed in God +and Colman, and they delivered the child for baptism to Colman who +baptised him thereupon, giving him the name of Declan. When, in the +presence of all, he had administered Baptism, Colman spoke this prophecy +concerning the infant "Truly, beloved child and lord you will be in +heaven and on earth most high and holy, and your good deeds, fame, and +sanctity will fill all (the four quarters of) Ireland and you will +convert your own nation and the Decies from paganism to Christianity. On +that account I bind myself to you by the tie of brotherhood and I commend +myself to your sanctity." + +4. Colman thereupon returned to his own abode; he commanded that Declan +should be brought up with due care, that he should be well trained, and +be set to study at the age of seven years if there could be found in his +neighbourhood a competent Christian scholar to undertake his tuition. +Even at the period of his baptism grace and surpassing charity manifested +themselves in the countenance of Declan so that it was understood of all +that great should be the goodness and the spiritual charm of his mature +age. When Dobhran had heard and seen these things concerning his kinsman +Erc he requested the latter and Deithin to give him the child to foster, +and with this request Erc complied. The name of the locality was +"Dobhran's Place" at that time, but since then it has been "Declan's +Place." Dobhran presented the homestead to Declan and removed his own +dwelling thence to another place. In after years, when Declan had become +a bishop, he erected there a celebrated cell in honour of God, and this +is the situation of the cell in question:--In the southern part of the +Decies, on the east side of Magh Sgiath and not far from the city of +Mochuda i.e. Lismore. For the space of seven years Declan was fostered +with great care by Dobhran (his father's brother) and was much loved by +him. God wrought many striking miracles through Declan's instrumentality +during those years. By aid of the Holy Spirit dwelling in him he +(Declan)--discreet Christian man that he was--avoided every fault and +every unlawful desire during that time. + +5. On the completion of seven years Declan was taken from his parents +and friends and fosterers to be sent to study as Colman had ordained. It +was to Dioma they sent him, a certain devout man perfect in the faith, +who had come at that time by God's design into Ireland having spent a +long period abroad in acquiring learning. He (Dioma) built in that place +a small cell wherein he might instruct Declan and dwell himself. There +was given him also, to instruct, together with Declan, another child, +scil., Cairbre Mac Colmain, who became afterwards a holy learned bishop. +Both these were for a considerable period pursuing their studies +together. + +6. There were seven men dwelling in Magh Sgiath, who frequently saw the +fiery globe which it has been already told they first beheld at the time +of Declan's birth. It happened by the Grace of God that they were the +first persons to reveal and describe that lightning. These seven came to +the place where Declan abode and took him for their director and master. +They made known publicly in the presence of all that, later on, he should +be a bishop and they spoke prophetically:--"The day, O beloved child and +servant of God, will come when we shall commit ourselves and our lands to +thee." And it fell out thus (as they foretold), for, upon believing, +they were baptised and became wise, devout (and) attentive and erected +seven churches in honour of God around Magh Sgiath. + +7. Declan remained a long time with Dioma, the holy man we have named, +and acquired science and sanctity and diversity of learning and doctrine, +and he was prudent, mild, and capable so that many who knew his nobility +of blood came when they had heard of the fullness of his sanctity and +grace. Moreover they submitted themselves to him and accepted his +religious rule. Declan judged it proper that he should visit Rome to +study discipline and ecclesiastical system, to secure for himself esteem +and approbation thence, and obtain authority to preach to the (Irish) +people and to bring back with him the rules of Rome as these obtained in +Rome itself. He set out with his followers and he tarried not till he +arrived in Rome where they remained some time. + +8. At the same period there was a holy bishop, i.e. Ailbe, who had been +in Rome for a number of years before this and was in the household of +Pope Hilary by whom he had been made a bishop. When Declan with his +disciples arrived in Rome Ailbe received him with great affection and +gladness and he bore testimony before the Roman people to his (Declan's) +sanctity of life and nobility of blood. He (Declan) therefore received +marks of honour and sincere affection from the people and clergy of Rome +when they came to understand how worthy he was, for he was comely, of +good appearance, humble in act, sweet in speech, prudent in counsel, +frank in conversation, virtuous in mien, generous in gifts, holy in life +and resplendent in miracles. + +9. When Declan had spent a considerable time in Rome he was ordained a +bishop by the Pope, who gave him church-books and rules and orders and +sent him to Ireland that he might preach there. Having bidden farewell +to the Pope and received the latter's blessing Declan commenced his +journey to Ireland. Many Romans followed him to Ireland to perform their +pilgrimage and to spend their lives there under the yoke and rule of +Bishop Declan, and amongst those who accompanied him was Runan, son of +the king of Rome; he was dear to Declan. + +10. On the road through Italy Bishop Declan and Patrick met. Patrick +was not a bishop at that time, though he was (made a bishop) subsequently +by Pope Celestinus, who sent him to preach to the Irish. Patrick was +truly chief bishop of the Irish island. They bade farewell to one +another and they made a league and bond of mutual fraternity and kissed +in token of peace. They departed thereupon each on his own journey, +scil.:--Declan to Ireland and Patrick to Rome. + +11. Declan was beginning mass one day in a church which lay in his road, +when there was sent him from heaven a little black bell, (which came) in +through the window of the church and remained on the altar before Declan. +Declan greatly rejoiced thereat and gave thanks and glory to Christ on +account of it, and it filled him with much courage to combat the error +and false teaching of heathendom. He gave the bell for safe keeping and +carriage, to Runan aforesaid, i.e. son of the king of Rome, and this is +its name in Ireland--"The Duibhin Declain," and it is from its colour it +derives its name, for its colour is black [dub]. There were manifested, +by grace of God and Declan's merits, many miracles through its agency and +it is still preserved in Declan's church. + +12. When Declan and his holy companions arrived at the Sea of Icht +[English Channel] he failed, owing to lack of money, to find a ship, for +he did not have the amount demanded, and every ship was refused him on +that account. He therefore struck his bell and prayed to God for help in +this extremity. In a short time after this they saw coming towards them +on the crest of the waves an empty, sailless ship and no man therein. +Thereupon Declan said:--"Let us enter the ship in the name of Christ, and +He who has sent it to us will direct it skilfully to what harbour soever +He wishes we should go." At the word of Declan they entered in, and the +ship floated tranquilly and safely until it reached harbour in England. +Upon its abandonment by Declan and his disciples the ship turned back and +went again to the place from which it had come and the people who saw the +miracles and heard of them magnified the name of the Lord and Declan, and +the words of the prophet David were verified:--"Mirabilis Deus in Sanctis +Suis" [Psalm 67(68):36] (God is wonderful in His Saints). + +13. After this Declan came to Ireland. Declan was wise like a serpent +and gentle like a dove and industrious like the bee, for as the bee +gathers honey and avoids the poisonous herbs so did Declan, for he +gathered the sweet sap of grace and Holy Scripture till he was filled +therewith. There were in Ireland before Patrick came thither four holy +bishops with their followers who evangelized and sowed the word of God +there; these are the four:--Ailbe, Bishop Ibar, Declan, and Ciaran. They +drew multitudes from error to the faith of Christ, although it was +Patrick who sowed the faith throughout Ireland and it is he who turned +chiefs and kings of Ireland to the way of baptism, faith and sacrifice +and everlasting judgment. + +14. These three, scil.:--Declan, Ailbe and Bishop Ibar made a bond of +friendship and a league amongst themselves and their spiritual posterity +in heaven and on earth for ever and they loved one another. SS. Ailbe +and Declan, especially, loved one another as if they were brothers so +that, on account of their mutual affection they did not like to be +separated from one another--except when their followers threatened to +separate them by force if they did not go apart for a very short +time. After this Declan returned to his own country--to the Decies of +Munster--where he preached, and baptized, in the name of Christ, many +whom he turned to the Catholic faith from the power of the devil. He +built numerous churches in which he placed many of his own followers to +serve and worship God and to draw people to God from the wiles of Satan. + +15. Once on a time Declan came on a visit to the place of his birth, +where he remained forty days there and established a religious house in +which devout men have dwelt ever since. Then came the seven men we have +already mentioned as having made their abode around Magh Sgiath and as +having prophesied concerning Declan. They now dedicated themselves and +their establishment to him as they had promised and these are their +names:--Mocellac and Riadan, Colman, Lactain, Finnlaoc, Kevin, &c. +[Mobi]. These therefore were under the rule and spiritual sway of bishop +Declan thenceforward, and they spent their lives devoutly there and +wrought many wonders afterwards. + +16. After some time Declan set out to visit Aongus MacNatfrich, king of +Cashel, to preach to him and to convert him to the faith of Christ. +Declan however had two uterine brothers, sons of Aongus, scil.: Colman +and Eoghan. The grace of the Holy Ghost inspiring him Colman went to +Ailbe of Emly and received baptism and the religious habit at the +latter's hands, and he remained for a space sedulously studying science +until he became a saintly and perfect man. Eochaid however remained as +he was (at home)--expecting the kingdom of Munster on his father's death, +and he besought his father to show due honour to his brother Declan. The +king did so and put no obstacle in the way of Declan's preaching but was +pleased with Declan's religion and doctrine, although he neither believed +nor accepted baptism himself. It is said that refusal (of baptism) was +based on this ground: Declan was of the Decies and of Conn's Half, while +Aongus himself was of the Eoghanacht of Cashel of Munster--always hostile +to the Desii. It was not therefore through ill will to the faith that he +believed not, as is proved from this that, when the king heard of the +coming to him of Patrick, the archbishop of Ireland, a man who was of +British race against which the Irish cherished no hate, not only did he +believe but he went from his own city of Cashel to meet him, professed +Christianity and was immediately baptised. + +17. After this Declan, having sown the word of God and preached to the +king (although the latter did not assent to his doctrines), proceeded to +his own country and they (the Desii) believed and received baptism except +the king alone and the people of his household who were every day +promising to believe and be baptised. It however came about through the +Devil's agency that they hesitated continually and procrastinated. + +18. Other authorities declare that Declan went many times to Rome, but +we have no written testimony from the ancient biographers that he went +there more than three times. On one of these occasions Declan paid a +visit to the holy bishop of the Britons whose name was David at the +church which is called Killmuine [Menevia] where the bishop dwelt beside +the shore of the sea which divides Ireland from Britain. The bishop +received Declan with honour and he remained there forty days, in +affection and joy, and they sang Mass each day and they entered into a +bond of charity which continued between themselves and their successors +for ever afterwards. On the expiration of the forty days Declan took +leave of David giving him a kiss in token of peace and set out himself +and his followers to the shore of the sea to take ship for Ireland. + +19. Now the bell which we have alluded to as sent from heaven to Declan, +was, at that time, in the custody of Runan to carry as we have said, for +Declan did not wish, on any account, to part with it. On this particular +day as they were proceeding towards the ship Runan entrusted it to +another member of the company. On reaching the shore however the latter +laid the bell on a rock by the shore and forgot it till they were half +way across the sea. Then they remembered it and on remembrance they were +much distressed. Declan was very sorrowful that the gift sent him by the +Lord from heaven should have been forgotten in a place where he never +expected to find it again. Thereupon raising his eyes heavenward he +prayed to God within his heart and he said to his followers:--"Lay aside +your sorrow for it is possible with God who sent that bell in the +beginning to send it now again by some marvellous ship." Very fully and +wonderfully and beautifully the creature without reason or understanding +obeyed its creator, for the very heavy unwieldy rock floated buoyantly +and without deviation, so that in a short time they beheld it in their +rear with the bell upon it. And when his people saw this wondrous thing +it filled them with love for God and reverence for their master. Declan +thereupon addressed them prophetically:--"Permit the bell to precede you +and follow it exactly and whatsoever haven it will enter into it is there +my city and my bishopric will be whence I shall go to paradise and there +my resurrection will be." Meantime the bell preceded the ship, and it +eased down its great speed remaining slightly in advance of the ship, so +that it could be seen from and not overtaken by the latter. The bell +directed its course to Ireland until it reached a harbour on the south +coast, scil.:--in the Decies of Munster, at an island called, at that +time, High Sheep Island [Aird na gCcaorac] and the ship made the same +port, as Declan declared. The holy man went ashore and gave thanks and +praise to God that he had reached the place of his resurrection. Now, in +that island depastured the sheep belonging to the wife of the chieftain +of Decies and it is thence that it derives its Irish name--Ard-na- +Ccaorac, scil.:--there was in it a high hill and it was a promontory +beautiful to behold. One of the party, ascending the summit of the hill, +said to Declan:--"How can this little height support your people?" +Declan replied:--"Do not call it little hill, beloved son, but 'great +height' [ard mor]," and that name has adhered to the city ever since, +scil.:--Ardmore-Declain. After this Declan went to the king of the Desii +and asked of him the aforesaid island. Whereupon the king gave it to +him. + +20. Declan next returned to Ait-mBreasail where, in a haven at the north +side, were the shipping and boats of the island, plying thither and +backwards. The people of the island hid all their boats not willing that +Declan should settle there; they dreaded greatly that if Declan came to +dwell there they themselves should be expelled. Whereupon his disciples +addressed Declan:--"Father," said they, "Many things are required (scil.: +from the mainland) and we must often go by boat to this island and there +will be (crossing) more frequently when you have gone to heaven and we +pray thee to abandon the place or else to obtain from God that the sea +recede from the land so that it can be entered dry shod, for Christ has +said:--'Whatsoever you shall ask of the Father in my name He will give it +to you' [John 15:16]; the place cannot be easily inhabited unless the sea +recede from it and on that account you cannot establish your city in it." +Declan answered them and said:--"How can I abandon the place ordained by +God and in which He has promised that my burial and resurrection shall +be? As to the alleged inconvenience of dwelling therein, do you wish me +to pray to God (for things) contrary to His will--to deprive the sea of +its natural domain? Nevertheless in compliance with your request I shall +pray to God and whatever thing be God's will, let it be done." Declan's +community thereupon rose up and said:--"Father, take your crosier as +Moses took the rod [Exodus 14:16] and strike the sea therewith and God +will thus show His will to you." His disciples prayed therefore to him +because they were tried and holy men. They put Declan's crosier in his +hand and he struck the water in the name of the Father and of the Son and +of the Holy Ghost and made the sign of the cross over the water and +immediately, by command and permission of God, the sea commenced to move +out from its accustomed place--so swiftly too that the monsters of the +sea were swimming and running and that it was with difficulty they +escaped with the sea. However, many fishes were left behind on the dry +strand owing to the suddenness of the ebb. Declan, his crosier in his +hand, pursued the receding tide and his disciples followed after him. +Moreover the sea and the departing monsters made much din and commotion +and when Declan arrived at the place where is now the margin of the sea a +stripling whose name was Mainchin, frightened at the thunder of the waves +and the cry of the unknown monsters with gaping mouths following the +(receding) water, exclaimed:--"Father, you have driven out the sea far +enough; for I am afraid of those horrid monsters." When Declan heard +this and (saw) the sea standing still at the word of the youth it +displeased him and turning round he struck him a slight blow on the nose. +Three drops of blood flowed from the wound on to the ground in three +separate places at the feet of Declan. Thereupon Declan blessed the nose +and the blood ceased immediately (to flow). Then Declan declared:--"It +was not I who drove out the sea but God in His own great power who +expelled it and He would have done still more had you not spoken the +words you have said." Three little wells of clear sweet water burst +forth in the place where fell the three drops of blood at the feet of +Declan, and these wells are there still and the colour of blood is seen +in them occasionally as a memorial of this miracle. The shore, rescued +from the sea, is a mile in width and is of great length around (the +island) and it is good and fertile land for tillage and pasture--lying +beneath the monastery of Declan. As to the crosier which was in Declan's +hand while he wrought this miracle, this is its name--the Feartach +Declain, from the miracles and marvels [fertaib] wrought through it. I +shall in another, subsequent, place relate some of these miracles +(narrated). + +21. After the expulsion of the sea by this famous Saint, scil.: Declan, +whose name and renown spread throughout Erin because of his great and +diverse miracles, he commenced to build a great monastery by the south +side of the stream which flows through the island into the sea. This +monastery is illustrious and beautiful and its name is Ardmor Declain, as +we have said. After this came many persons to Declan, drawn from the +uttermost parts of Ireland, by the fame of his holy living; they devoted +themselves, soul and body to God and Declan, binding themselves beneath +his yoke and his rule. Moreover he built himself in every place +throughout the territory of the Decies, churches and monasteries and not +alone in his own territory (did he build) but in other regions of Ireland +under tribute to him. Great too were the multitudes (thousands) of men +and women who were under his spiritual sway and rule, in the places we +have referred to, throughout Ireland, where happily they passed their +lives. He ordained some of his disciples bishops and appointed them in +these places to sow the seed of faith and religion therein. Gentleness +and charity manifested themselves in Declan to such an extent that his +disciples preferred to live under his immediate control and under his +direction as subjects than to be in authority in another monastery. + +22. After this the holy renowned bishop, head of justice and faith in +the Gaelic island came into Ireland, i.e. Patrick sent by Celestinus, the +Pope. Aongus Mac Nathfrich went to meet him soon as he heard the account +of his coming. He conducted him (Patrick) with reverence and great +honour to his own royal city--to Cashel. Then Patrick baptised him and +blessed himself and his people and his city. Patrick heard that the +prince of the Decies had not been baptised and did not believe, that +there was a disagreement between the prince and Declan and that the +former refused to receive instruction from the latter. Patrick thereupon +set out to preach to the prince aforesaid. Next, as to the four bishops +we have named who had been in Rome: Except Declan alone they were not in +perfect agreement with Patrick. It is true that subsequently to this +they did enter into a league of peace and harmonious actions with Patrick +and paid him fealty. Ciaran, however, paid him all respect and reverence +and was of one mind with him present or absent. Ailbe then, when he saw +the kings and rulers of Ireland paying homage to Patrick and going out to +meet him, came himself to Cashel, to wait on him and he also paid homage +to him (Patrick) and submitted to his jurisdiction, in presence of the +king and all others. Bear in mind it was Ailbe whom the other holy +bishops had elected their superior. He therefore came first to Patrick, +lest the others, on his account, should offer opposition to Patrick, and +also that by his example the others might be more easily drawn to his +jurisdiction and rule. Bishop Ibar however would on no account consent +to be subject to Patrick, for it was displeasing to him that a foreigner +should be patron of Ireland. It happened that Patrick in his origin was +of the Britons and he was nurtured in Ireland having been sold to bondage +in his boyhood. There arose misunderstanding and dissension between +Patrick and Bishop Ibar at first, although (eventually), by intervention +of the angel of peace, they formed a mutual fellowship and brotherly +compact and they remained in agreement for ever after. But Declan did +not wish to disagree at all with Patrick for they had formed a mutual +bond of friendship on the Italian highway and it is thus the angel +commanded him to go to Patrick and obey him:-- + +23. The angel of God came to Declan and said to him "Go quickly to +Patrick and prevent him cursing your kindred and country, for to-night, +in the plain which is called Inneoin, he is fasting against the king, and +if he curses your people they shall be accursed for ever." Thereupon +Declan set out in haste by direction of the angel to Inneoin, i.e. the +place which is in the centre of the plain of Femhin in the northern part +of the Decies. He crossed Slieve Gua [Knockmaeldown] and over the Suir +and arrived on the following morning at the place where Patrick was. +When Patrick and his disciples heard that Declan was there they welcomed +him warmly for they had been told he would not come. Moreover Patrick +and his people received him with great honour. But Declan made obeisance +to Patrick and besought him earnestly that he should not execrate his +people and that he should not curse them nor the land in which they +dwelt, and he promised to allow Patrick do as he pleased. And Patrick +replied:--"On account of your prayer not only shall I not curse them but +I shall give them a blessing." Declan went thereupon to the place where +was the king of Decies who was a neighbour of his. But he contemned +Patrick and he would not believe him even at the request of Declan. +Moreover Declan promised rewards to him if he would go to Patrick to +receive baptism at his hands and assent to the faith. But he would not +assent on any account. When Declan saw this, scil.:--that the king of +the Decies, who was named Ledban, was obstinate in his infidelity and +in his devilry--through fear lest Patrick should curse his race and +country--he (Declan) turned to the assembly and addressed +them:--"Separate yourselves from this accursed man lest you become +yourselves accursed on his account, for I have myself baptised and +blessed you, but come you," said he, "with us, to Patrick, whom God has +sent to bless you, for he has been chosen Archbishop and chief Patron of +all Erin; moreover, I have a right to my own patrimony and to be king +over you as that man (Ledban) has been." At this speech they all arose +and followed Declan who brought them into the presence of Patrick and +said to the latter:--"See how the whole people of the Deisi have come with +me as their Lord to thee and they have left the accursed prince whose +subjects they have been, and behold they are ready to reverence you and +to obey you for it is from me they have received baptism." At this +Patrick rose up with his followers and he blessed the people of the Deisi +and not them alone, but their woods and water and land. Whereupon the +chiefs and nobles of the Deisi said:--"Who will be King or Lord over us +now?" And Declan replied:--"I am your lord and whomsoever I shall +appoint offer you as lord, Patrick and all of us will bless, and he shall +be king over you all." And he whom Declan appointed was Feargal +MacCormac a certain young man of the nation of the Deisi who was a +kinsman of Declan himself. He (Declan) set him in the midst of the +assembly in the king's place and he was pleasing to all. Whereupon +Patrick and Declan blessed him and each of them apart proclaimed him +chieftain. Patrick moreover promised the young man that he should be +brave and strong in battle, that the land should be fruitful during his +reign. Thus have the kings of the Deisi always been. + +24. After these things Declan and Feargal Mac Cormac (king of the Deisi) +and his people gave a large area of land to Patrick in the neighbourhood +of Magh Feimhin and this belongs to his successors ever since and great +lordship there. And the place which was given over to him is not far +from the Suir. There is a great very clear fountain there which is +called "Patrick's Well" and this was dear to Patrick. After this, with +blessing, they took leave of one another and Patrick returned to Cashel +to Aongus Mac Natfrich and Declan went with him. + +25. A miracle was wrought at that time on Declan through the +intercession and prayers of Patrick for as Declan was walking carelessly +along he trod upon a piece of sharp iron which cut his foot so that blood +flowed freely and Declan began to limp. Ailbe of Emly was present at +this miracle and Sechnall a bishop of Patrick's and a holy and wise man, +and he is said to be the first bishop buried in Ireland. The wound which +Declan had received grieved them very much. Patrick was informed of the +accident and was grieved thereat. He said:--"Heal, O Master (i.e. God), +the foot of your own servant who bears much toil and hardship on your +account." Patrick laid his hand on the wounded foot and made over it the +sign of the cross when immediately the flow of blood ceased, the lips of +the wound united, a cicatrix formed upon it and a cure was effected. +Then Declan rose up with his foot healed and joined in praising God. The +soldiers and fighting men who were present cried out loudly, blessing God +and the saints. + +26. As Patrick and the saints were in Cashel, i.e. Ailbe and Declan with +their disciples, in the territory of Aongus Mac Nathfrich, they made much +progress against paganism and errors in faith and they converted them +(the pagans) to Christianity. It was ordained by Patrick and Aongus Mac +Natfrich in presence of the assembly, that the Archbishopric of Munster +should belong to Ailbe, and to Declan, in like manner, was ordained +(committed) his own race, i.e. the Deisi, whom he had converted to be his +parish and his episcopate. As the Irish should serve Patrick, so should +the Deisi serve Declan as their patron, and Patrick made the "rann":-- + +"Humble Ailbe the Patrick of Munster, greater than any saying, Declan, +Patrick of the Deisi--the Decies to Declan for ever." + +This is equivalent to saying that Ailbe was a second Patrick and that +Declan was a second Patrick of the Decies. After that, when the king had +bidden them farewell and they had all taken leave of one another, the +saints returned to their respective territories to sow therein the seed +of faith. + +27. Declan and Ferghal Mac Cormac, king of the Deisi, with his army and +followers, met one another at Indeoin and they made still more strong on +the people the bond of Christian obligation. The king we have already +mentioned, scil.:--Ledban, the recusant to the Christian name, was +rejected of all and he came to nothing, leaving no knowledge (memory) of +his history, as is written of the enemies of the faith:--"Their memory +perisheth like a sound" [Psalm 9:7]. Moreover Declan and Fergal and the +chief men of the Deisi decreed this as the place where the king of the +Deisi should be inaugurated for ever thenceforward, because it was there +Patrick and Declan blessed the king, Fergal; moreover tradition states +that it was there the kings were crowned and ruled over the Deisi in +pagan times. + +28. At that time there broke out a dreadful plague in Munster and it was +more deadly in Cashel than elsewhere. Thus it affected those whom it +attacked: it first changed their colour to yellow and then killed them. +Now Aongus had, in a stone fort called "Rath na nIrlann," on the western +side of Cashel, seven noble hostages. It happened that in one and the +same night they all died of the plague. The king was much affected +thereat and he gave orders to have the fact concealed lest it should +bring disgrace or even war upon him, for the hostages were scions of the +strongest and most powerful families in Munster. On the morrow however +Declan came to Cashel and talked with Aonghus. The king welcomed him +heartily and addressing him said to him in presence of persons of his +court, "I pray you, Declan, servant of God, that in the name of Christ +you would raise to life for me the seven hostages whom I held in bondage +from the chieftains of Munster. They have died from the plague of which +you hear, and I fear their fathers will raise war and rebellion against +me, for they are men of strength and power, and indeed we are ashamed of +their death, for they will say that it is we ourselves who killed them." +Declan answered the king, saying to him:--"Such a matter as this--to +raise one to life from death--belongs to Omnipotence alone--but I shall +do whatever is in my power. I go where the bodies lie and pray to God +for them and let Him do in their regard what seems best to Him." Next, +Declan, with a multitude and his disciples together with the king's +councillors, went to the place where the corpses of the young men lay. +The king followed after them until he came in sight of the bodies. +Declan, full of divine faith, entered the house wherein they lay and he +sprinkled holy water over them and prayed for them in the presence of +all, saying:--"O Lord Jesus Christ, only Son of the living God, for thine +own name's sake wake the dead that they may be strengthened in the +Catholic faith through our instrumentality." Thereupon, at Declan's +prayer, the group (of corpses) revived and they moved their eyelids and +Declan said to them "In the name of Christ, our Saviour, stand up and +bless and glorify God." And at his words they rose up immediately and +spoke to all. Declan then announced to the king that they were alive and +well. When people saw this remarkable miracle they all gave glory and +praise to God. The fame of Declan thereupon spread throughout Erin and +the king rejoiced for restoration of his hostages. + +29. After this the people of Cashel besought Bishop Declan to bless +their city and banish the plague from them and to intercede with God for +those stricken with sickness who could not escape from its toils. Declan +seeing the people's faith prayed to God and signed with the sign of +Redemption the four points of the compass. As he concluded, there was +verified the saying of Christ to His disciples when leaving them and +going to heaven:--"Super aegros imponent manus et bene habebunt" [Mark +16:18] (I shall place my hands on the sick and they shall be healed). +Soon as Declan had made the sign of the cross each one who was ill became +well and not alone were these restored to health but (all the sick) of +the whole region round about in whatsoever place there were persons +ailing. Moreover the plague was banished from every place and all +rejoiced greatly thereat as well as on account of the resurrection of the +dead men we have narrated. The king thereupon ordered tribute and honour +to Declan and his successors from himself and from every king who should +hold Cashel ever after. Upon this the glorious bishop Declan blessed +Aongus together with his city and people and returned back to his own +place. + +30. One night Declan was a guest at the house of a wealthy man who dwelt +in the southern part of Magh Femhin; this is the kind of person his host +was, scil.:--a pagan who rejected the true faith, and his name was +Dercan. He resolved to amuse himself at the Christians' expense; +accordingly he ordered his servants to kill a dog secretly, to cut off +its head and feet and to bury them in the earth and then to cook the +flesh properly and to set it before Declan and his company as their meal. +Moreover he directed that the dog should be so fat that his flesh might +pass as mutton. When, in due course, it was cooked, the flesh, together +with bread and other food, was laid before Declan and his following. At +that moment Declan had fallen asleep but he was aroused by his disciples +that he might bless their meal. He observed to them:--"Indeed I see, +connected with this meat, the ministry of the devil." Whereupon he +questioned the waiters as to the meat--what kind it was and whence +procured. They replied: "Our master ordered us to kill a fat ram for +you and we have done as he commanded." Declan said, "Our Master is Jesus +Christ and may He show us what it is that connects the ministry of Satan +with this meat and preserve thy servants from eating forbidden food." As +he spoke thus Declan saw in the meat the claw of a dog, for, without +intending it, they had boiled one quarter of the dog with its paw +adhering; they thought they had buried it (the incriminating limb) with +the other paws. Declan exclaimed, "This is not a sheep's but a dog's +foot." When the attendants heard this they went at once to their master +and related the matter to him. Then Dercan came to Declan, accepted his +faith and received Baptism at his hands, giving himself and his posterity +to Declan for ever. Moreover he gave his homestead to Declan and his +people were baptised. After this Dercan requested that Declan should +bless something in his homestead which might remain as a memorial of him +(Dercan) for ever. Then Declan blessed a bell which he perceived there +and its name is Clog-Dhercain ("Dercan's Bell"); moreover, he declared: +"I endow it with this virtue (power) that if the king of Decies march +around it when going to battle, against his enemies, or to punish +violation of his rights, he shall return safely and with victory." This +promise has been frequently fulfilled, but proud (men) undertaking battle +or conflict unjustly even if they march around it do not obtain victory +but success remains with the enemy. The name of that homestead was +Teach-Dhercain ("Dercain's House") and its name now is Coningean, from +the claw [con] of the hound or dog aforesaid. To this place came the +saintly concourse, scil:--Coman and Ultan, MacErc and Mocoba and +Maclaisren, who dedicated themselves to (the service of) God and placed +themselves under the spiritual rule and sway of Declan. + +31. Thereupon Declan established a monastery in that place, scil.--in +Coningin--and he placed there this holy community with a further band of +disciples. Ultan however he took away with him to the place whither he +went. + +32. On another (subsequent) occasion Declan visited Bregia, i.e. the +original territory which belonged to his race previous to the expulsion +of his ancestors. There he was treated with particular honour by the +king of Tara and by the chieftains of Meath by whom he was beloved, since +it was from themselves (their tribe and territory) that his forbears had +gone out, for that region was the patrimony of his race and within it +lies Tara. Declan instituted therein a monastery of Canons, on land +which he received from the king, and it is from him the place is named. +Moreover he left therein a relic or illuminated book and a famous gospel +which he was accustomed to carry always with him. The gospel is still +preserved with much honour in the place and miracles are wrought through +it. After this again he turned towards Munster. + +33. Declan was once travelling through Ossory when he wished to remain +for the night in a certain village. But the villagers not only did not +receive him but actually drove him forth by force of arms. The saint +however prayed to God that it might happen to them what the Sacred +Scripture says, "Vengeance is mine I will repay" [Deuteronomy 32:35]. +The dwellers in the village, who numbered sixty, died that same night +with the exception of two men and ten women to whom the conduct of the +others towards the saint had been displeasing. On the morrow these +men and women came humbly to the place where Declan was and they told +him--what he himself foreknew--how miserably the others had died. They +themselves did penance and they bestowed on Declan a suitable site +whereon he built a monastery and he got another piece of land and had the +dead buried where he built the monastery. The name of that monastery is +Cill-Colm-Dearg. This Colm-Dearg was a kind, holy man and a disciple of +Declan. He was of East Leinster, i.e. of the Dal Meiscorb, and it is +from him that the monastery is named. When he (Declan) had completed +that place he came to his own territory again, i.e. to the Decies. + +34. On a certain day Declan came to a place called Ait-Breasail and the +dwellers therein would not allow him to enter their village; moreover +they hid all their boats so that he could not go into his own island, for +they hated him very much. In consideration however of the sanctity of +his servant, who prayed in patience, God the All-Powerful turned the sea +into dry land as you have already heard. Declan passed the night in an +empty stable out in the plain and the people of the village did not give +him even a fire. Whereupon, appropriately the anger of God fell on them, +who had not compassion enough to supply the disciple of God with a fire. +There came fire from heaven on them to consume them all [together with +their] homestead and village, so that the place has been ever since a +wilderness accursed, as the prophet writes: "civitates eorum +destruxisti" [Psalm 9:7] (the dwellings of the unmerciful are laid +waste). + +35. On yet another occasion Declan was in his own region--travelling +over Slieve Gua in the Decies, when his horse from some cause got lame so +that he could proceed no further. Declan however, seeing a herd of deer +roaming the mountain close to him, said to one of his people: "Go, and +bring me for my chariot one of these deer to replace my horse and take +with you this halter for him." Without any misgiving the disciple went +on till he reached the deer which waited quietly for him. He chose the +animal which was largest and therefore strongest, and, bringing him back, +yoked him to the chariot. The deer thereupon obediently and without +effort carried Bishop Declan till he came to Magh Femhin, where, when he +reached a house of entertainment, the saint unloosed the stag and bade +him to go free as was his nature. Accordingly, at the command of the +saintly man and in the presence of all, the stag returned on the same +road back (to the mountain). Dormanach is the name of the man aforesaid +who brought the stag to Declan and him Declan blessed and gave him a +piece of land on the north of Decies close by the Eoghanacht and his +posterity live till now in that place. + +36. On another occasion, Declan, accompanied, as usual, by a large +following, was travelling, when one member of the party fell on the road +and broke his shin bone in twain. Declan saw the accident and, pitying +the injured man, he directed an individual of the company to bandage the +broken limb so that the sufferer might not die through excess of pain and +loss of blood. All replied that they could not endure to dress the wound +owing to their horror thereof. But there was one of the company, Daluadh +by name, who faced the wound boldly and confidently and said: "In the +name of Christ and of Declan our patron I shall be surgeon to this foot"; +and he said that jestingly. Nevertheless he bandaged the foot carefully +and blessed it aright in the name of God and Declan, and in a little +while the wound healed and they all gave praise to God. Then Declan said +to Daluadh: "You promised to be surgeon to that foot in Christ's name +and in mine and God has vouchsafed to heal it at these words: on this +account you will be a true physician for ever and your children and your +seed after you for ever shall also possess the healing art, and +whomsoever they shall practise healing upon in God's name and mine, +provided there be no hatred [in their hearts] nor too great covetousness +of a physician's fee to him, God and myself shall send relief." This +promise of Declan has been fulfilled in the case of that family. + +37. On another occasion, as Declan was travelling in the northern part +of Magh Femhin beside the Suir, he met there a man who was carrying a +little infant to get it baptised. Declan said to the people [his +"muinntear," or following]: "Wait here till I baptise yonder child," for +it was revealed by the Holy Ghost to him that he [the babe] should serve +God. The attendant replied to him that they had neither a vessel nor +salt for the baptism. Declan said: "We have a wide vessel, the Suir, +and God will send us salt, for this child is destined to become holy and +wonderful [in his works]." Thereupon Declan took up a fistful of earth +and, making prayer in his heart to God, he signed the clay with the sign +of the cross of redemption. It (the handful of earth) became white, dry +salt, and all, on seeing it, gave thanks and honour to God and Declan. +The infant was baptised there and the name of Ciaran given him. Declan +said: "Bring up my spiritual son carefully and send him, at a fitting +age, for education to a holy man who is well instructed in the faith for +he will become a shining bright pillar in the Church." And it was this +child, Ciaran Mac Eochaidh, who founded in after years a famous monastery +(from which he migrated to heaven) and another place (monastery) besides. +He worked many miracles and holy signs and this is the name of his +monastery Tiprut [Tubrid] and this is where it is:--in the western part +of the Decies in Ui Faithe between Slieve Grot [Galtee] and Sieve Cua and +it is within the bishopric of Declan. + +38. On another day there came a woman to Declan's monastery not far from +the city where she dwelt. She committed a theft that day in Declan's +monastery as she had often done previously, and this is the thing she +stole--a "habellum" [possibly an item of tribute]; she departed homewards +taking it with her and there met her a group of people on the highway, +and the earth, in their presence, swallowed her up, and she cast out the +tabellum from her bosom and it was quickly turned into a stone which the +wayfarers took and brought with them to Declan. Declan himself had in +supernatural vision seen all that happened to the woman in punishment of +her theft, and the name of Declan was magnified owing to those marvels so +that fear took possession of all-those present and those absent. The +stone in question remains still in Declan's graveyard in his own town of +Ardmore-Declain, where it stands on an elevated place in memory of this +miracle. + +39. A rich man named Fintan was childless, for his wife was barren for +many years. He himself, with his wife, visited Declan and promised large +alms and performance of good works provided he (Declan) would pray that +they might have children: they held it as certain that if Declan but +prayed for them God would grant them children. Declan therefore, praying +to God and blessing the pair, said: "Proceed to your home and through +God's bounty you shall have offspring." The couple returned home, with +great joy for the blessing and for the promise of the offspring. The +following night, Fintan lay with his wife and she conceived and brought +forth twin sons, scil.: Fiacha and Aodh, who, together with their +children and descendants were under tribute and service to God and +Declan. + +40. When it was made known to a certain holy man, scil.:--Ailbe of Emly +Iubar, chief bishop of Munster, that his last days had come, he said to +his disciples: "Beloved brethren, I wish, before I die, to visit my very +dear fellow worker, scil.:--Declan." After this Ailbe set out on the +journey and an angel of God came to Declan notifying him that Ailbe was +on his way to visit him. On the angel's notification Declan ordered his +disciples to prepare the house for Ailbe's coming. He himself went to +meet Ailbe as far as the place which is called Druim Luctraidh +[Luchluachra]. Thence they came home together and Ailbe, treated with +great honour by Declan and his people, stayed fourteen pleasant days. +After that the aged saint returned home again to his own city, scil.:--to +Emly Iubar. Declan came and many of his people, escorting Ailbe, to +Druim Luchtradh, and Ailbe bade him return to his own city. The two knew +they should not see one another in this world ever again. In taking +leave of one another, therefore, they shed plentiful tears of sorrow and +they instituted an everlasting compact and league between their +successors in that place. Ailbe moreover blessed the city of Declan, his +clergy and people and Declan did the same for Ailbe and they kissed one +another in token of love and peace and each returned to his own city. + +41. On a certain day the Castle of Cinaedh, King of the Deisi, took fire +and it burned violently. It happened however that Declan was proceeding +towards the castle on some business and he was grieved to see it burning; +he flung towards it the staff to which we have referred in connection +with the drying up of the sea, and it (the staff) flew hovering in the +air with heavenly wings till it reached the midst of the flame and the +fire was immediately extinguished of its own accord through the grace of +God and virtue of the staff and of Declan to whom it belonged. The place +from which Declan cast the staff was a long mile distant from the castle +and when the king, i.e. Cinaedh, and all the others witnessed this +miracle they were filled with amazement and gave thanks to God and to +Declan when they came to know that it was he who wrought it. Now the +place where the castle stands is not far from the Suir, i.e. on the south +side of it and the place from which Declan cast the staff is beside a +ford which is in the Suir or a stream which flows beside the monastery +called Mag Laca [Molough] which the holy virgins, daughters of the king +of Decies, have built in honour of God. There is a pile of stones and a +cross in the place to commemorate this miracle. + +42. On another occasion there approached a foreign fleet towards +Declan's city and this was their design--to destroy and to plunder it of +persons and of cattle, because they (the foreigners) were people hostile +to the faith. Many members of the community ran with great haste to tell +Declan of the fleet which threatened the town and to request him to beg +the assistance of God against the invaders. Declan knew the man amongst +his own disciples who was holiest and most abounding in grace, scil., +Ultan, already mentioned, and him he ordered to pray to God against the +fleet. Ultan had pity on the Christian people and he went instantly, at +the command of Declan, in front of the fleet and he held his left hand +against it, and, on the spot, the sea swallowed them like sacks full of +lead, and the drowned sailors were changed into large rocks which stand +not far from the mouth of the haven where they are visible (standing) +high out of the sea from that time till now. All Christians who +witnessed this rejoiced and were glad and they gave great praise and +glory to God and to Declan their own patron who caused the working of +this miracle and of many other miracles besides. Next there arose a +contention between Ultan and Declan concerning this miracle, for Ultan +attributed it to Declan and Declan credited it to Ultan; and it has +become a proverb since in Ireland when people hear of danger or +jeopardy:--"The left hand of Ultan against you (the danger)." Ultan +became, after the death of Declan, a miracle-working abbot of many other +holy monks. + +43. The holy and glorious archbishop, i.e. Patrick, sent one of his own +followers to Declan with power and authority (delegation) from the +archbishop. And proceeding through the southern part of Decies he was +drowned in a river [the Lickey] there, two miles from the city of Declan. +When Declan heard this he was grieved and he said: "Indeed it grieves me +that a servant of God and of Patrick who sent him to visit me, having +travelled all over Ireland, should be drowned in a river of my own +territory. Get my chariot for me that I may go in haste to see his +corpse, so that Patrick may come to hear of the worry and the grief I +have undergone because of his disciple's death." The body had been +recovered before the arrival of Declan by others who were close at hand +and it had been placed on a bier to be carried to Ciaran for interment. +Declan however met them on the way, when he ordered the body to be laid +down on the ground. They supposed he was about to recite the Office for +the Dead. He (Declan) advanced to the place where the bier was and +lifted the sheet covering the face. It (the face) looked dark and +deformed as is usual in the case of the drowned. He prayed to God and +shed tears, but no one heard aught of what he said. After this he +commanded:--"In the name of the Trinity, in the name of the Father and of +the Son and of the Holy Ghost whose religious yoke I bear myself, arise +to us for God has given your life to me." He (the dead man) rose up +immediately at the command and he greeted Declan and all the others. +Whereupon Declan and his disciples received him with honour. At first he +was not completely cured but (was) like one convalescent until (complete) +health returned to him by degrees again. He however accompanied Declan +and remained some time with him and there was much rejoicing in Declan's +city on account of the miracle and his (Declan's) name and fame extended +over the country generally. This disciple of Patrick was named Ballin; +he returned with great joy and he told him (Patrick) that Declan had +raised him from the dead. To many others likewise he related what had +happened to him. Patrick, in presence of many persons, hearing of the +miracle gave glory and thanks to God and the name of Declan was +magnified. + +44. With this extraordinary miracle wrought by Declan we wish to +conclude our discourse. The number of miracles he wrought, but which are +not written here, you are to judge and gather from what we have written. +And we wish moreover that you would understand that he healed the infirm, +that he gave sight to the eyes of the blind, cleansed lepers, and gave +"their walk" to cripples; that he obtained hearing for the deaf, and that +he healed many and various diseases in many different places throughout +Ireland--(things) which are not written here because of their length and +because they are so numerous to record, for fear it should tire readers +to hear so much said of one particular person. On that account we shall +pass them by. + +45. When Declan realised that his last days were at hand and that the +time remaining to him was very short he summoned to him his own spiritual +son, scil., MacLiag (residing) in the monastery which is on the eastern +side of the Decies close to the Leinstermen in order that, at the hour of +death, he might receive the Body and Blood of Christ and the Sacraments +of the Church from his hands. Thereupon he foretold to his disciples the +day of his death and he commanded them to bring him to his own city, for +it was not there he dwelt at the time but in a small venerable cell which +he had ordered to be built for him between the hill called Ardmore +Declain and the ocean--in a narrow place at the brink of the sea by which +there flows down from the hill above a small shining stream about which +are trees and bushes all around, and it is called Disert Declain. Thence +to the city it is a short mile and the reason why Declan used go there +was to avoid turmoil and noise so that he might be able to read and pray +and fast there. Indeed it was not easy for him to stay even there +because of the multitude of disciples and paupers and pilgrims and +beggars who followed him thither. Declan was however generous and very +sympathetic and on that account it is recorded by tradition that a great +following (of poor, &c.), generally accompanied him and that moreover the +little cell was very dear to him for the reason we have given, and many +devout people have made it their practice to dwell therein. + +46. When Declan fell ill and became weak in body, but still strong in +hope and faith and love of God, he returned to his own city--his people +and disciples and clergy surrounding him. He discoursed to them on the +commands of God and he enjoined on them to live holily after his death, +to be submissive to authority and to follow as closely as possible the +way he had marked out and to preserve his city in a state of piety and +under religious rule. And when they had all heard the discourse it +grieved them greatly to perceive, from what he had said, he realised that +in a short time he would go away to heaven from them. But they were +consoled by his gentle words and then there came to him the holy man, to +wit, MacLiag, at his own request, already referred to. He [Declan] +received the Body and Blood of Christ and the Sacraments of the Church +from his [MacLiag's] hand--surrounded by holy men and his disciples, and +he blessed his people and his dependents and his poor, and he kissed them +in token of love and peace. Thus, having banished images and the +sacrifices to idols, having converted multitudes to the true faith, +having established monasteries and ecclesiastical orders in various +places, having spent his whole life profitably and holily, this glorious +bishop went with the angels to heaven on the ninth day of the Kalends of +August [July 24] and his body was blessed and honoured with Masses and +chanting by holy men and by the people of the Decies and by his own monks +and disciples collected from every quarter at the time of his death. He +was buried with honour in his own city--in Declan's High-Place--in the +tomb which by direction of an angel he had himself indicated--which +moreover has wrought wonders and holy signs from that time to now. He +departed to the Unity of the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost in +Saecula Saeculorum; Amen. FINIS. + + +The poor brother, Michael O'Clery originally copied this life of Declan +in Cashel, from the book of Eochy O'Heffernan. The date, A.D., at which +that ancient book of Eochy was written is 1582. And the same life has +now been re-written in the Convent of the Friars at Druiske, the date, +A.D., 27th February, 1629. + + + +NOTE + + +The Irish text of the "rann" from paragraph 26 reads: + +Ailbe umal; Patraicc Muman, mo gacrath, +Declan, Patraicc na nDeisi: na Deisi ag Declan gan brat. + + +And the Latin rendering: + +Albeus est humilis dixit Caephurnia proles; +Patriciusque esto hinc Ailbee Momonia. +Declanus pariter patronus Desius esto; +Inter Desenses Patriciusque suos. + + + + +LIFE OF ST. MOCHUDA. + +"BEATA MOCUDA." + + +The renowned bishop, Carthach, commonly called Mochuda, was of the +territory of Ciarraighe Luachra [North Kerry] and of the race of Fergus +Mac Roigh. + +The illustrious bishop, who is generally known as Mochuda, was of the +Ciarraighe Luachra; to be exact--he was of the line of Fergus Mac Roigh, +who held the kingship of Ulster, till the time that he gave the kingship +to a woman for a year and did not get it back when the year was over. +His descendants are now to be found throughout various provinces of +Ireland. He fell himself, through the treachery of Oilioll, king of +Connaght, and the latter's jealousy of his wife, Meadbh, daughter of +Eochaid Feidhleach. Finghen Mac Gnaoi of Ciarraighe Luachra was father +of Mochuda, and his mother was Mead, daughter of Finghin, of Corca +Duibhne, in the vicinity of the stream called Laune in the western part +of Ireland. The forthcoming birth of Mochuda was revealed to St. +Comhghall by an angel, announcing--"There will be conceived a child in +the western part of Erin, and Carthach will be his baptismal name and he +will be beloved of God and men--in heaven and on earth. He will come to +you seeking direction as to a proposed pilgrimage to Rome--but you must +not permit the journey for the Lord has assigned him to you; but let him +remain with you a whole year." All this came to pass, as foretold. In +similar manner the future Mochuda was foretold to St. Brendan by an +angel who declared: "There will come to you a wonder-working brother +who will be the patron of you and your kindred for ever; the region of +Ciarraighe will be divided between you and him, and Carthach will be his +name; to multitudes his advent will be cause for joy and he will gain +multitudes for heaven. His first city will be Raithen [Rahen or Rahan] +in the region of Fircheall, territory of Meath and central plain of +Ireland; this will become a place revered of men, and revered and famous +will be his second city and church, scil.:--Lismore, which shall possess +lordship and great pre-eminence." + +One day when there was a large meeting of people at a certain place in +Kerry, the men and women who were present saw descending a fiery globe, +which rested on the head of Mochuda's mother, at that time pregnant of +the future saint. The ball of fire did no one any injury but +disappeared before it did injury to anyone. All those who beheld this +marvel wondered thereat and speculated what it could portend. This is +what it did mean:--that the graces of the Holy Spirit had visited this +woman and her holy child unborn. + +Mochuda's father was a rich and powerful chieftain owning two strong +lioses--one, on the south side of Slieve Mish, and the other, in which +Mochuda first saw the light, beside the River Maing [Maine]. Both +places were blessed for sake of the Saint, who was conceived in one of +them and born in the other; it is even said that no evil disposed or +vicious person can live in either. Carthage in due course was sent to +be baptised, and, on the way, the servant who bore the infant, meeting a +saintly man named Aodhgan, asked him to perform the ceremony. There was +however no water in the place, but a beautiful well, which burst forth +for the occasion and still remains, yielded a supply. With the water of +this well the infant was baptised and Carthach, as the angel had +foretold, was the name given him. Nevertheless 'Mochuda' is the name by +which he was commonly known, because he was so called, through affection +and regard, by his master (St. Carthach Senior). Many scarcely know +that he has any other name than Mochuda and it is lawful to write either +Mochuda or Carthach. Speaking prophetically Aodhgan said of him:--"This +child whom I have baptised will become famous and he will be beloved by +God and men." That prophecy has been fulfilled, for Mochuda was +graceful of figure and handsome of features as David, he was master of +his passions as Daniel, and mild and gentle like Moses. His parents +however despised him because he valued not earthly vanities and in his +regard were verified the words of David:--"Pater meus et mater mea +derliquerunt me, Dominus autem assumpsit me" [Psalm 26(27):10] (For my +father and my mother have left me and the Lord hath taken me up). Like +David too--who kept the sheep of his father--Mochuda, with other youths, +herded his father's swine in his boyhood. + +On a certain day as Mochuda, with his companion swineherds and their +charges, was in the vicinity of the River Maing, he heard that the king +of Ciarraighe Luachra was at his residence called Achadh-di; he waited +on the king by whom he was kindly and politely received. The king, +whose name was Maoltuile and who wished to see Mochuda frequently, +invited the youth to come every day to the royal lios and to bring with +him his companions, who would be made welcome for his sake. One evening +as Mochuda sate in the king's presence Maoltuile gazed so long and so +intently at the youth that the queen (Dand, daughter of Maolduin Mac +Aodha Beannan, king of Munster) reproved her husband asking why he +stared every evening at the boy. "O wife," answered the king, "if you +but saw what I see, you would never gaze at anything else, for I behold +a wondrous golden chain about his neck and a column of fire reaching +from his head to the heavens, and since I first beheld these marvels my +affection for the boy has largely increased." "Then," said the queen, +"let him sit there beside you." Thenceforth the youth sate as +suggested. Sometimes Mochuda herded the swine in the woods and at other +times he remained with the king in his court. + +One day as Mochuda was keeping his herd as usual beside the river +already alluded to, he heard the bishop and his clerics pass by, +chanting psalms as they went along. The Spirit of God touched the boy's +heart and leaving his pigs Mochuda followed the procession as far as the +monastery called Tuaim [Druim Fertain] [into which the clerics entered]. +And as the bishop and his household sate down to eat, Mochuda, unknown +to them, concealed himself--sitting in the shadow of the doorway. +Meanwhile the king, Maoltuile, was troubled about the boy, noticing his +absence [from the homestead at Achaddi] that evening and not knowing the +cause thereof. He immediately sent messengers to seek the youth +throughout the country, and one of these found him sitting, as +indicated, in the shadow of the doorway of the bishop's house. The +messenger took Mochuda with him back to the king. The latter questioned +him:--"My child, why have you stayed away in this manner?" Mochuda +replied, "Sire, this is why I have stayed away--through attraction of +the holy chant of the bishop and clergy; I have never heard anything so +beautiful as this; the clerics sang as they went along the whole way +before me; they sang until they arrived at their house, and thenceforth +they sang till they went to sleep. The bishop however remained by +himself far into the night praying by himself when the others had +retired. And I wish, O king, that I might learn [their psalms and +ritual]." Hearing this the king at once sent a message to the bishop +requesting the latter to come to him. + +About this time Mochuda's father gave a feast in the king's honour and +as the company were at supper the king calling Mochuda before him +offered him a shield, sword, javelin, and princely robe, saying: "Take +these and be henceforth a knight to me as your father has been." But +Mochuda declined the offer. "What is it," asked the king, "that you +will accept, so that [whatever it be] I may give it to you?" Mochuda +answered:--"I do not long for anything of earth--only that I be allowed +to learn the psalms of the clerics which I heard them sing." In this +answer the king discerned the working of divine grace, whereupon he +promised the youth the favour he asked for. Shortly afterwards the +bishop, Carthach, whom we have mentioned as sent for by the king, +arrived, and to him the latter entrusted Mochuda to be instructed in +reading and writing. With great joy the bishop undertook his charge for +he saw that his pupil was marked by grace, and under the bishop's +guidance and tutelage Mochuda remained till his promotion to the +priesthood. + +Mochuda was very handsome of features with the result that at different +times during his youth maidens to the number of thirty were so enamoured +of him that they could not conceal their feeling. But Mochuda prayed +for them, and obtained for them by his prayers that their carnal love +should be turned into a spiritual. They afterwards became consecrated +religious and within what to-day is his parish he built them cells and +monasteries which the holy virgins placed under his protection and +jurisdiction. + +Finntan Mac Cartan, bringing with him an infant for baptism came to +Bishop Carthach. The latter said to him:--"Let the young priest there +who was ordained to-day baptise the child." Whereupon Finntan handed the +infant to the young priest. Mochuda enquired the name he was to impose, +and the father answered--Fodhran. Having administered baptism Mochuda +taking the infant's hand prophesied concerning the babe--"This hand will +be strong in battle and will win hostages and submission of the Clan +Torna whose country lies in mid-Kerry from Sliabh Luachra [Slieve +Lougher] to the sea. From his seed, moreover, will spring kings to the +end of time, unless indeed they refuse me due allegiance, and if, at any +time, they incur displeasure of my successors their kingship and +dominion will come to an end." This prophecy has been fulfilled. + +Sometime afterwards Mochuda with his master, Carthach, visited King +Maoltuile, whom they found at a place called Feorainn, near Tralee, from +which the lords and kings of Kerry take their name. Said Bishop +Carthach:--"Here, Sire, is the youth you gave me to train; he is a good +scholar and he has studied the holy writings with much success. I have +ordained him a priest and (his) grace is manifest in many ways." "What +recompense do you desire for your labour?" asked the king. "Only," +replied Carthach, "that you would place yourself and your posterity +under the spiritual jurisdiction of this young priest, the servant of +God." The king, however, hesitated--because of Mochuda's youth. Soon +as Carthach perceived this he himself inclined to Mochuda and bending +his knee before him exclaimed:--"I hereby give myself, my parish and +monastery to God and to Mochuda for ever." Touched by the bishop's +example the king prostrated himself before Mochuda and pledged to God +and to him, his soul and body and posterity to the end of time. Then +Mochuda placed his foot upon the king's neck and measured the royal body +with his foot. Against this proceeding of Mochuda's a member of the +king's party protested in abusive and insulting terms--"It is a haughty +act of yours, laying your foot upon the king's neck, for be it known to +you the body on which you trample is worthy of respect." On hearing +this Mochuda ceased to measure the king and declared:--"The neck upon +which I have set my heel shall never be decapitated and the body which I +have measured with my foot shall not be slain and but for your +interference there would not be wanting anything to him or his seed for +ever." Addressing (specially) the interrupter, he prophesied:--"You and +your posterity will be for ever contemptible among the tribes." +Blessing the king he promised him prosperity here and heaven hereafter +and assured him:--"If any one of your posterity contemn my successors +refusing me my lawful dues he will never reign over the kingdom of +Kerry." This prophecy has been fulfilled. + +Next, Mochuda, at the suggestion of his master, the bishop, and the King +Maoltuile, built a famous cell called Kiltulach [Kiltallagh] at a place +between Sliabh Mis and the River Maing in the southern part of Kerry. +Here his many miracles won him the esteem of all. In that region he +found two bishops already settled before him, scil.:--Dibhilin and +Domailgig. These became envious of the honour paid him and the fame he +acquired, and they treated him evilly. Whereupon he went to Maoltuile +and told him the state of affairs. Soon as the king heard the tale he +came with Mochuda from the place where he then was on the bank of the +Luimnech and stayed not till they reached the summit of Sliabh Mis, when +he addressed Mochuda: "Leave this confined region for the present to +the envy and jealousy of the bishops and hereafter it will become yours +and your coarbs' to the end of time." The advice commended itself to +Mochuda and he thanked the king for it. Thereupon he abandoned his cell +to the aforesaid bishops and determined to set out alone as a pilgrim to +the northern part of Ireland. + +In the meantime an angel visited Comghall and repeated to him what had +been foretold him already--that there should come to him a young priest +desirous for Christ's sake of pilgrimage beyond the seas--that Comghall +should dissuade him and, instead, retain the stranger with him for a +year at Bangor. "And how am I to recognise him?" asked Comghall. The +angel answered:--"Whom you shall see going from the church to the +guest-house" (for it was Mochuda's custom to visit the church first). +[See note 1.] Comghall announced to his household that there was coming +to them a distinguished stranger, well-beloved of God, of whose advent +an angel had twice foretold him. Some time later Mochuda arrived at +Comghall's establishment, and he went first to the monastery and +Comghall recognised him and bade him welcome. In that place Mochuda +remained a whole year, as the angel had said, and at the end of the year +he returned to his own country where he built many cells and churches +and worked many wonders, winning many souls to religion and to good +works. Many persons moreover placed themselves, their children, and +their kindred under his jurisdiction, and the great parishes of their +own territory were assigned to him, and finally the episcopate of Kerry +became his. + +Subsequent to this Mochuda, having committed the care of his cell and +parish to certain pious and suitable persons, set out himself, +accompanied by a few disciples, through the south of Munster to visit +the Monastery of Ciaran Mac Fionntan at Rosgiallan [Rostellan]. From +Ciaran Mochuda enquired, where--in south Munster (as the angel had +mentioned to Comghall)--the chief and most distinguished of these +churches should be. Ciaran, who possessed the spirit of prophecy, +replied--"You shall go first to Meath where you will found a famous +church in the territory of Ibh Neill and there you will remain for forty +years. You shall be driven thence into exile and you will return to +Munster wherein will be your greatest and most renowned church." +Mochuda offered to place himself under the patronage and jurisdiction of +Ciaran: "Not so, shall it be," said Ciaran, "but rather do I put myself +and my church under you, for ever, reserving only that my son, Fuadhran, +be my successor in this place." This Mochuda assented to and Fuadhran +governed the monastic city for twenty years as Ciaran's successor in the +abbacy. + +Next, Mochuda entered the territory of the Munster Decies where dwelt +the Clanna Ruadhain who placed themselves and all their churches under +him, and one Colman Mac Cobhthaigh a wealthy magnate of the region +donated extensive lands to Mochuda who placed them under devout persons +--to hold for him. Proceeding thence Mochuda took his way across Sliabh +Gua looking back from the summit of which he saw by the bank of the Nemh +[Blackwater] angels ascending towards heaven and descending thence. And +they took up with them to heaven a silver chair with a golden image +thereon. This was the place in which long afterwards he founded his +famous church and whence he departed himself to glory. + +Hence Mochuda travelled to Molua Mac Coinche's monastery of Clonfert +[Kyle], on the confines of Leinster and Munster. He found Molua in the +harvest field in the midst of a 'meitheal' [team] of reapers. Before +setting out on this present journey of his Mochuda had, with one +exception, dismissed all his disciples to their various homes for he, +but with a single companion, did not wish to enter the strange land +ostentatiously. The single follower whom Mochuda had retained wishing +to remain at Clonfert, said to St. Molua: "Holy father, I should wish +to remain here with you." Molua answered:--"I shall permit you, +brother, if your pious master consents." Mochuda, having dismissed so +many, would not make any difficulty about an individual, and so he gave +the monk his freedom. Mochuda thereupon set out alone, which, Molua's +monks observing, they remark:--"It were time for that aged man to remain +in some monastery, for it is unbecoming such a (senior) monk to wander +about alone." They did not know that he, of whom they spoke, was +Mochuda, for it was not the custom of the latter to make himself known +to many. "Say not so," said Molua (to the censorious brethren), "for +the day will come when our community and city will seem but +insignificant beside his--though now he goes alone; you do not know that +he is Mochuda whom many obey and whom many more will obey in times to +come." + +As Mochuda went on his lonely way he met two monks who asked him whither +he was bound. "To Colman Elo," he answered. Then said one of them to +him:--"Take us with you as monks and subjects," for they judged him from +his countenance to be a holy man. Mochuda accepted the monks and they +journeyed on together till they came to Colman's monastery [Lynally]. +Mochuda said to Colman: "Father I would remain here with you." "Not +so," replied Colman, "but go you to a place called Rahen in this +vicinity; that is the place ordained by God for your dwelling and you +shall have there a large community in the service of God and from that +place you will get your first name--Mochuda of Rahen." Having said +farewell to Colman and obtained his blessing Mochuda, with his two +monks, set out for the place indicated and there in the beginning he +built a small cell and Colman and he often afterwards exchanged visits. + +Colman had in the beginning--some time previous to Mochuda's +advent--contemplated establishing himself at Rahen and he had left there +two or three [bundles] of rods remarking to his disciples that another +should come after him for whom and not for himself God had destined this +place. It was with this material that Mochuda commenced to build his +cell as Colman had foretold in the first instance. He erected later a +great monastery in which he lived forty years and had eight hundred and +eighty seven religious under his guidance and rule. + +Subsequent to Mochuda's foundation of Rahen his miracles and the marvels +he wrought spread his fame far and wide through Ireland and through +Britain, and multitudes came to him from various parts of those +countries to give themselves to the service of God under his guidance. +In the beginning he refused worldly gifts from others although his +church was honoured and patronised by neighbouring kings and chieftains +who offered him lands and cattle and money and many other things. +Mochuda kept his monks employed in hard labour and in ploughing the +ground for he wanted them to be always humble. Others, however, of the +Saints of Erin did not force their monks to servile labour in this +fashion. + +Mochuda was consecrated bishop by many saints and from time to time he +visited his parish in Kerry, but as a rule he remained at Rahen with his +monks, for it is monks he had with him not clerics. + +On a certain day in the (early) springtime there came to tempt him a +druid who said to him:--"In the name of your God cause this apple-tree +branch to produce foliage." Mochuda knew that it was in contempt for +divine power the druid proposed this, and the branch put forth leaves on +the instant. The druid demanded "In the name of your God, put blossom +on it." Mochuda made the sign of the cross [over the twig] and it +blossomed presently. The druid persisted:--"What profits blossom +without fruit?" [said the druid]. Mochuda, for the third time, +blessed the branch and it produced a quantity of fruit. The druid +said:--"Follower of Christ, cause the fruit to ripen." Mochuda blessed +the tree and the fruit, fully ripe, fell to the earth. The druid picked +up an apple off the ground and examining it he saw it was quite sour, +whereupon he objected:--"Such miracles as these are worthless since it +leaves the fruit uneatable." Mochuda blessed the apples and they all +became sweet as honey, and in punishment of his opposition the magician +was deprived for a year of his eyesight. At the end of a year he came to +Mochuda and did penance, whereupon he received his sight back again and +he returned home rejoicing. + +On another occasion there came to Mochuda a secular who brought with him +his deaf and dumb son whom he besought the saint to heal. Mochuda +prayed to God for him and said, "My son, hear and speak." The boy +answered immediately and said, "Man of God, I give myself and my +inheritance to you for ever," and thenceforth he possessed the use of +all his senses and members. + +Another day a young man who had contracted leprosy came to Mochuda +showing him his misery and his wretched condition. The saint prayed for +him and he was restored to health. + +At another time there came to Mochuda a man whose face was deformed. He +besought the saint's aid and his face was healed upon the spot. + +On yet another occasion in the springtime a poor man who dwelt some +distance from the monastery of Rahen, came to Mochuda, and asked the +loan of two oxen and a ploughman to do a day's ploughing for him. But +Mochuda, as we have already said, had no cattle, for it was the monks +themselves who dug and tilled the soil. Mochuda summoned one of his +labourers named Aodhan whom he ordered to go into the nearest wood to +bring back thence a pair of deer with him and go along with them to the +poor man to do the spring work for him. Aodhan did dutifully all that +Mochuda bade him--he found the two deer, went with the poor man and +ploughed for him till the work was completed when the deer returned to +their habitat and Aodhan to Mochuda. + +On another day there came to Mochuda a man troubled by the devil. +Mochuda cured him at once, driving the demons from him and the man went +his way thanking God and Mochuda. + +Once, when the brethren were at work in the fields and in the kitchen, +Mochuda went to the mill to grind meal for the monk's use, and nine +robbers, who hated him, followed with the intention of murdering him. +The chief of the band sent each member of the gang to the mill in turn. +Not one of them however could enter the mill because of a violent flame +of fire which encircled the building round about, through the goodness +of God protecting Mochuda from the robbers. The latter, through the +mill door, watched Mochuda who slept portion of the time and was awake +another portion. And while he slept the mill stopped of itself, and +while he was awake it went of its own accord. The gang thereupon +returned to the chief and told him all they had seen, which, when he +heard, he became enraged. Then he hastened himself to the mill to kill +Mochuda. But he experienced the same things as all the others and he +was unable to hurt Mochuda. He returned to his followers and said to +them--"Let us stay here till he comes out of the mill, for we need not +fear that he will call help nor need we fear his arm." Shortly +afterwards Mochuda came out carrying his load. The robbers rushed on +him, but they were unable to do him any injury for as each man of them +tried to draw his weapon his hands became powerless, so he was unable to +use them. Mochuda requested them to allow him pass with his burden and +he promised them on his credit and his word that he should return to +them when he had deposited the sack in safety. They took his word and he +went, deposited his bag of meal in the kitchen, and returned meekly to +martyrdom. The brethren imagined he had gone to a quiet place for +prayer as was his custom. When he returned to the robbers they drew +their weapons several times to kill him but they were unable to do so. +Seeing this wonder they were moved to repentance and they gave +themselves to God and to Mochuda for ever and, till the time of their +death, they remained under his guidance and rule and many subsequent +edifying and famous acts of theirs are recorded. + +An angel came to Mochuda at Rahen on another occasion announcing to him +the command of God that he should go that same day to Mac Fhiodaig, king +of his own region of Kerry Luachra, and administer to him Holy Communion +and Confession as he was on the point of death. Mochuda asked the angel +how he could reach Kerry that day from Rahen. The angel thereupon (for +reply) took him up through the air in a fiery chariot until they arrived +at the king's residence. Mochuda administered Holy Communion and +Confession and the king having bestowed generous alms upon him departed +hence to glory. Mochuda returned that same day to Rahen where he found +the community singing vespers. + +On another occasion Mochuda visited Colman Elo at the latter's monastery +of Lynally and requested Colman to come with him to consecrate for him +his cemetery at Rahen, for Colman, assisted by angels, was in the habit +of consecrating cemeteries and God gave him the privilege that no one +should go to hell who was interred in a grave consecrated by him. +Colman said to him:--"Return home and on the fifth day from now I shall +follow." Mochuda returned home, where he remained till the fifth day, +when, seeing that Colman had not arrived he came again to the latter. +"Father," said he, "why have you not kept your promise?" To which +Colman replied, "I came and an angel with me that day and consecrated +your cemetery. Return now and you will find it marked (consecrated) on +the south side of your own cell. Lay it out as it is there indicated +and think not that its area is too small, because a larger will be +consecrated for you later, by the angels, in the southern part of Erin, +namely--in Lismore." Mochuda returned and found the cemetery duly marked +as Colman had indicated. + +About the same time clerics came across Slieve Luachra in the territory +of Kerry to the church of Ita, honoured [abbess] of Conall Gabhra. They +had with them a child upon seeing whom Ita wept bitterly. The clerics +demanded why she cried at seeing them. "Blessed," she answered, "is the +hour in which that youth in your company was born, for no one shall ever +go to hell from the cemetery in which he will be buried, but, alas, for +me, that I cannot be buried therein." The clerics asked what cemetery +it was in which he should be buried. "In Mochuda's cemetery," said she, +"which though it be as yet unconsecrated will be honoured and famous in +times to come." This all came to pass, for the youth afterwards became +a monk under Mochuda and he is buried in the monastic cemetery of +Lismore as Ita had foretold. + +A child on another occasion fell off the bridge of Rahen into the river +and was drowned. The body was a day and a night in the water before it +was recovered. Then it was brought to Mochuda who, moved with +compassion for the father in his loss of an only son, restored the boy +to life. Moreover he himself fostered the child for a considerable time +afterwards and when the youth had grown up, he sent him back to his own +country of Delbhna. Mochuda's foster son begat sons and daughters and he +gave himself and them, as well as his inheritance, to God and Mochuda, +and his descendants are to this day servile tenants of the monastery. + +Once as Mochuda, with large offerings, was returning from Kerry to Rahen +he passed through the confines of Delbhna [Lemanaghan?] by the lake +called Muincine [Lough Gur?] where he and his party were overtaken by +night. They found here before them by the roadside revolving wheels, +which an artisan, who was erecting a mill on the stream from the lake, +had set up for a joke. As the wheels revolved they made a terrific +noise which was heard by the whole neighbourhood. Many of the +inhabitants of the neighbouring villages aroused by the noise rushed +out, with appeals for help and loud cries, to investigate the matter. +Mochuda's people were frightened by the din and their pack and riding +horses stampeded and lost their loads and it was not without difficulty +that they were caught again. Mochuda knew what caused the noise and he +told the workmen who had played this mischievous trick that they should +be scattered throughout the different provinces of Ireland, that they +should be always worthless and unprofitable, that the mill they were +engaged on should never be finished and that their progeny after them +should be valueless race of mischief-makers. The latter are called the +Hi-Enna [Ui Enna Aine Aulium] to-day. + +One day Mochuda came to a place called Cluain-Breanainn where apples +abounded. His followers asked some apples for him but the orchard owner +refused them. Said Mochuda:--"From this day forward no fruit shall grow +in you orchard for ever," and that prophecy has been fulfilled. + +Mochuda had in his monastery twelve exceedingly perfect disciples, +scil.:--Caoinche Mac Mellain [Mochua Mac Mellain or Cronan], who was the +first monk to enter Rahen; Mucoinog [Mochoemog]; the three sons of +Nascainn--Goban, Srafan, and Laisren; Mulua [Molua]; Lugair; Mochomog +Eile; Aodhan [Aedhan]; Fachtna Coinceann [Fiachna or Fiochrae]; Fionnlog +and Mochomog who became a bishop later. The virtue of these monks +surpassed belief and Mochuda wished to mitigate their austerities before +their death. He therefore built separate cells for them that they might +have some comfort in their old age as a reward for their virtue in +youth; moreover he predicted blessings for them. He made [a prophecy] +for one of them, mentioned above, scil.:--Mochua Mac Mellain, for whom +he had built a comfortable cell at a place called Cluain-Da-Chrann. He +said to him: "Your place of resurrection will not be here but in +another place which God has given you." That prediction has been +verified. To a second disciple, scil.:--Fiachna, Mochuda said:--"Your +resurrection will not be in this place though I have made you a cell +here; you will have three further abiding places, nevertheless it will +be with your own companion, Aodhan, that your remains will rest and your +resurrection will be in the territory of Ui Torna, and it is from you +that the place will get its name." For this Aodhan alluded to Mochuda +likewise built another cell in the land of Ui Torna close by Slieve +Luachra, and speaking prophetically he said to him: "The remains of +your fellow-disciple, Fiachna, will be carried to you hither and from +him will this place be named." That statement has been verified, for +the church is now called Cill-Fiachna and it was first called +Cill-Aeghain. Concerning other persons, Mochuda prophesied various +other things, all of them have come to pass. + +A child born of secret adultery was abandoned close by the monastery of +Rahen and Mochuda fostered the child until he became a bishop, though no +one knew his name or his progenitors. Mochuda said:--"This child's name +is Dioma and his father is Cormac of the race of Eochaidh Eachach." All +thereupon magnified the foreknowledge of Mochuda, which he had from no +other than the Holy Spirit. Having consecrated him bishop, Mochuda +instructed him: "Go in haste to your own native region of Hy-Eachach in +the southern confines of Munster for there will your resurrection be. +War and domestic strife shall arise among your race and kinsfolk unless +you arrive there soon to prevent it." Dioma set out, accompanied by +another bishop, Cuana by name, who was also a disciple of Mochuda's. +They travelled into Ibh Eachach and Dioma preached the word of God to +his brethren and tribesmen. He made peace between them and they built a +monastery for him and he placed himself, his kindred, and parish under +his chosen master, Mochuda, and he ended his life (there) in peace. + +On another occasion Mochuda travelled from Rahen to the provinces of +Munster and entered Ciarraighe Corca. It happened that Cairbre Mac +Criomhthain, who was king of Munster, was at that time in Magh-Cuirce, +the place to which Mochuda came. At the same time there fell a fire +ball which destroyed one of the king's residences, killing his wife, +many of his people and his son, Aodh Mac Cairbre, who were buried in the +falling ruin. There were killed there moreover two good carriage horses +of the king's. Cairbre besought Mochuda that he would restore the queen +and his son to life, and when the saint saw the king's faith he prayed +for him to God and then addressing the dead he said,--"Arise." They +arose thereupon and he gave them safe to the king and they all gave +glory and thanks to God and Mochuda. The king moreover made large +offerings of land and servile tenants to Mochuda. But one of the +tenants, through pride and jealousy, refused to obey Mochuda, +notwithstanding the king's command. Mochuda said: "Your posterity will +die out and their inheritance, for sake of which you (mis)behave towards +me, shall become mine for ever; whosoever takes from me that which +another has given me shall be deprived of heaven and earth." That man +and his posterity soon came to nought. + +On another occasion Mochuda sent a golden belt to Fergus Mac Criomhthan +who suffered from uncleanness of skin arising from kidney disease and +upon application of the girdle, by the blessing of Mochuda he recovered. + +Another time again a king of Munster, Cathal Mac Aodha, in the region of +Cuirche, was a sufferer from a combination of complaints--he was deaf, +lame, and blind, and when Mochuda came to see him the king and his +friends prayed the saint to cure him. Mochuda therefore prayed for him +and made the sign of the cross on his eyes and ears and immediately he +was healed of all his maladies--he heard and saw perfectly, and Cathal +gave extensive lands to God and Mochuda for ever, scil:--Oilean Cathail +and Ros-Beg and Ros-Mor and Inis-Pic [Spike Island]. Mochuda placed a +religious community in Ros-Beg to build there a church in honour of God. +Mochuda himself commenced to build a church on Inis-Pic and he remained +there a whole year. [On his departure] Mochuda left there--in the +monastery of Inis-Pic--to watch over it, in his stead, and to keep it +in perfect order--the three disciples whom we have already named +(scil:--the three sons of Nascon, i.e. Goban a bishop, Srafan a priest, +and holy Laisren) together with the saintly bishop, Dardomaighen +[Domangenum], (who had conferred orders on them in presence of Mochuda) +and forty monks. Thereupon Mochuda returned to Rahen. That island we +have mentioned, scil.:--Inis-Pic, is a most holy place in which an +exceedingly devout community constantly dwell. + +Mochuda next directed his steps eastward through Munster and he crossed +the river then called Nemh, and now named the Abhainn More. As he +crossed he saw a large apple floating in the middle of the ford. This +he took up and carried away with him in his hand. Hence (that ford is +named) Ath-Ubhla in Fermoy [Ballyhooley]. His attendant asked Mochuda +for the apple, but the latter refused to give it saying--"God will work +a miracle by that apple and through me to-day: we shall meet Cuana Mac +Cailcin's daughter whose right hand is powerless so that she cannot move +it from her side. But she shall be cured by the power of God through +this apple." This was accomplished. Mochuda espied the child playing a +game with the other girls in the faithche [lawn] of the Lios. He +approached and said to her:--"Take this apple." She, as usual, put +forth her left hand for the fruit. "You shall not get it in that hand, +but take it in the other." The girl full of faith tried to put out the +right hand, and on the instant the hand became full of strength and +blood and motion so that she took the apple in it. All rejoiced thereat +and were amazed at the wonder wrought. That night Cuana said to his +daughter: "Choose yourself which you prefer of the royal youths of +Munster and whomsoever your choice be I shall obtain in marriage for +you." "The only spouse I shall have," said she, "is the man who cured +my hand." "Do you hear what she says O Mochuda?" said the king. +"Entrust the child to me," answered Mochuda, "I shall present her as a +bride to God who has healed her hand." Whereupon Cuana gave his +daughter Flandnait, together with her dowry and lands on the bank of +Nemh, to God and to Mochuda for ever. Cuana was almost incredibly +generous. Mochuda took the maiden with him to Rahen where she passed her +years happily with the religious women there till Mochuda was expelled +by the kings of Tara as you may hear. He took Flandnait with him (from +Rahen) in his party to her own native region that she might build +herself a cell there. She did build a famous cell at Cluain Dallain in +Mochuda's own parish. + +Previous to his expulsion (from Rahen) Mochuda visited the place where +(later) he built Lismore and he heard the voice of persons reading at +Rahen, wherefore he said to his followers: "I know that this is the +place where God will permit us to build our monastery." This prophecy +was subsequently verified. + +On a certain occasion Columcille came to Rahen where Mochuda was and +asked him:--"Is this place in which you now are dear to you?" "It is, +indeed," answered Mochuda. Columcille said: "Let not what I say to you +trouble you--this will not be the place of your resurrection, for the +king of Erin and his family will grow jealous of you owing to +machinations of some of the Irish clergy, and they shall eventually +drive you hence." Mochuda questioned Columcille who had a true +prophetic gift--"In what other place then will my resurrection be?" +Columcille told him--"The place where from the summit of Slieve Gua you +saw the host of angels building a chair of silver with a statue of gold +therein on the bank of the Nemh--there will your resurrection be, and +the chair of silver is your church in the midst of them [, and you are +truly the golden statue in its midst]." Mochuda believing what he heard +thanked and glorified God. + +As Mochuda on another day was at Rahen there came to him a priest and +monk of his own community from the northern part of Munster; he made a +reverence as was the custom of the monks, in Mochuda's presence and said +to him, "Father, I have complied with all your commands and the precepts +of God from the day I left Rahen till now--except this--that, without +your permission, I have taken my brother from the secular life." +"Verily I say to you," answered Mochuda, "if you were to go to the top +of a high hill and to shout as loudly as you could and were to bring to +me all who heard the cry I should not refuse the habit of religion to +one of them." Hearing these words all realised the character and extent +of Mochuda's charity and returned thanks to God for it. + +On a certain day about vesper time, because of the holiness of the hour, +Mochuda said to his monks:--"We shall not eat to-day till each one of +you has made his confession," for he knew that some one of them had ill +will in his heart against another. All the brethren thereupon confessed +to him. One of them in the course of his confession stated: "I love +not your miller and the cause of my lack of charity towards him is this, +that when I come to the mill he will not lift the loads off the horses +and he will neither help me to fill the meal sacks nor to load them on +the horse when filled. And not this alone but he does everything that +is disagreeable to me; moreover I cannot tell, but God knows, why he so +acts. Often I have thought of striking him or even beating him to +death." Mochuda replied, "Brother dear, the prophet says--'Declina a +malo et fac bonum' [Psalm 36(37):27] (Avoid evil and do good). Following +this precept let you act kindly towards the miller and that charity of +yours will move him to charity towards you and ye shall yet be steadfast +friends." Things went on thus for three days--the monk doing all he +could to placate the miller. Nevertheless the miller did not cease his +persecution, nor the brother his hate of the miller. On the third day +Mochuda directed the brother to confess to him again. The brother said: +--"This is my confession, Father, I do not yet love the miller." Mochuda +observed:--"He will change to-night, and to-morrow he will not break +fast till you meet him and you shall sit on the same seat, at the same +table, and you shall remain fast friends for the rest of your lives." +All this came to pass; for that monk was, through the instruction of +Mochuda, filled with the grace of the Divine Spirit. And he glorified +and praised Mochuda, for he recognised him as a man favoured by the Holy +Ghost. + +On another occasion two British monks of Mochuda's monastery had a +conversation in secret. Mochuda, they said, is very old though there is +no immediate appearance of approaching death--and there is no doubt that +his equal in virtue or good works will never be found--therefore if he +were out of the way one of us might succeed him. Let us then kill him +as there is no likelihood of his natural death within a reasonable time. +They resolved therefore to drown him in the river towards close of the +following night and to conceal all traces so that the crime could never +be discovered. They found him subsequently in a lonely place where he +was accustomed to pray. They bound him tightly and carried him between +them on their shoulders to the water. On their way to the river they +met one of the monks who used to walk around the cemetery every night. +He said to them: "What is that you carry?" They replied that it was +portion of the monastic washing which they were taking to the river. He +however, under the insistent suggestion of the Holy Spirit, believed +them not. He said: "Put down your load till we examine it." They were +constrained to obey and the burden proved to be--Mochuda. The monk who +detected [the proposed murder] was the overseer of the homestead. He +said mournfully, "My God, it is a dreadful work you are about." Mochuda +said gently:--"Son, it were well for me had that been done to me for I +should now be numbered among the holy martyrs. And it were bad for them +(the two wicked monks) for it is with Judas the betrayer of his Lord +they should be tortured for ever, who had desired my death for their own +advancement. Neither these wretched men themselves nor anyone of their +nation shall be my coarb for ever, but my successors shall be of his +race through whom God has rescued me. Moreover my city shall never be +without men of the British race who will be butts and laughing-stocks +and serve no useful purpose." The person who saved Mochuda was of the +Ciarraighe race and it is of that same people that the coarbs and +successors of Mochuda have commonly been ever since. [See note 2.] + +Mochuda refused for a long while, as we have already said, to accept +cattle or horses from anyone; it was the monks themselves who dug and +cultivated the land and they did all the haulage of the monastery on +their own backs. St. Fionan however who was a kinsman of Mochuda and +had just returned from Rome, came at this time on a visit to the +monastery. He reproached Mochuda saying: "Mochuda, why do you impose +the burden of brute beasts upon rational beings? Is it not for use of +the latter that all other animals have been created? Of a truth I shall +not taste food in this house till you have remedied this grievance." +Thenceforth Mochuda--in honour of Fionan--permitted his monks to accept +horses and oxen from the people and he freed them from the hardship +alluded to. Sometime later the holy abbot, Lachtaoin [St. Lachten], +compassionating Mochuda and his monks because of their lack of cattle +paid a visit to Rahen bringing with him a gift of thirty cows and a +bull, also a couple of cattlemen and two dairymaids. Coming near Rahen +he left the cattle in a secluded place, for he did not wish them to be +seen. Thereupon he went himself to the monastery and simulating illness +requested a drink of milk. The house steward went to Mochuda to tell +him that Lachtaoin was ill and required milk. Mochuda ordered the +steward to fill a pitcher with water and bring it to him--and this order +was executed. Mochuda blessed the water which immediately was changed +into sweet new milk apparently of that day's milking. He sent the milk +to Lachtaoin but the latter identified it as milk miraculously produced; +he in turn blessed it with the result that it was changed back again +into water. He complained:--"It is not water but milk I have +asked for." The messenger related this fact publicly. Lachtaoin +declared:--"Mochuda is a good monk but his successors will not be able to +change water to milk," and to the messenger he said--"Go to Mochuda and +tell him that I shall not break bread in this house until he accept the +alms which I have brought to the community." On Mochuda agreeing to +accept them he handed over the cattle and dairymen to the monks of Rahen +and the stewards took charge of them. Mochuda said thereupon, that he +should not have accepted the cattle but as a compliment to Lachtaoin. +Lachtaoin replied:--"From this day forward there will be plenty cattle +and worldly substance in your dwelling-place and there will be a +multitude of holy people in the other place whence you are to depart to +heaven (for you will be exiled from your present home)." After they had +mutually blessed and taken leave and pledged friendship Lachtaoin +departed. + +Once, at harvest time, the farm steward came to Mochuda complaining +that, though the crop was dead ripe, a sufficient number of harvesters +could not be found. Mochuda answered: "Go in peace, dear brother, and +God will send you satisfactory reapers." This promise was fulfilled, +for a band of angels came to the ripest and largest fields, reaped and +bound a great deal quickly, and gathered the crop into one place. The +monks marvelled, though they knew it was God's work and they praised and +thanked Him and Mochuda. + +The spirit of obedience amongst Mochuda's monks was such that if any +senior member of the community ordered another to lie in the fire he +would be obeyed. As an instance of this,--some of the brethren were on +one occasion baking bread in an oven when one the monks said to another +younger than himself, "The bread is burning: take it out instantly." +There was an iron shovel for drawing out the bread but the brother could +not find it on the instant. He heeded not the flames which shot out of +the oven's mouth but caught the hot bread and shifted it with his hands +and suffered no hurt whatever. On another day the monks were engaged in +labour beside the river which runs through the monastery. One of the +senior monks called upon a young monk named Colman to do a certain piece +of work. Immediately, as he had not named any particular Colman, twelve +monks of the name rushed into the water. The readiness and exactness of +the obedience practised was displayed in this incident. + +Great moreover was their meekness and patience in sickness or ill-health +as appears from the case of the monk out of the wounds of whose body +maggots fell as he walked; yet he never complained or told anyone or +left his work for two moments although it was plain from his appearance +that his health was declining, and he was growing thinner from day to +day. The brothers pitied him very much. At length Mochuda questioned +him--putting him under obedience to tell the truth--as to the cause of +his decline. The monk thereupon showed him his sides which were torn by +a twig tied fast around them. Mochuda asked him who had done that +barbarous and intolerable thing to him. The monk answered:--"One day +while we were drawing logs of timber from the wood my girdle broke from +the strain, so that my clothes hung loose. A monk behind me saw this +and cutting a twig tied it so tightly around my sides that it has caused +my flesh to mortify." Mochuda asked--"And why did you not loosen the +twig?" The monk replied--"Because my body in not my own and he who tied +it (the withe) has never loosed it." It was a whole year since the +withe had been fastened around him. Mochuda said to him:--"Brother, you +have suffered great pain; as a reward thereof take now you choice--your +restoration to bodily health or spiritual health by immediate departure +hence to eternal life." He answered, deciding to go to heaven:--"Why +should I desire to remain in this life?" Having received the Sacrament +and the Holy Communion he departed hence to glory. + +There came to Mochuda on another occasion with her husband, a woman +named Brigh whose hand lay withered and useless by her side: she +besought the saint to cure her hand. Moreover she was pregnant at the +time. Mochuda held out an apple in his hand to her as he had done +before to Flandnait, the daughter of Cuana, saying--"Alleluia, put forth +your nerveless hand to take this apple." She did as she was told and +took the apple from his hand and was cured; moreover as she tasted the +fruit parturition came on--without pain or inconvenience, after which +[the pair] returned to their home rejoicing. + +In fulfilment of the prophecy of Columcille and other holy men that +Mochuda should be expelled from Rahen the king of Tara, Blathmac, the +son of Aodh Slaine, and his brother Diarmuid came, together with some +clergy of the Cluain Earaird [Clonard] community, to carry out the +eviction [in A.D. 635]. They said to him, "Leave this monastery and +region and seek a place for yourself elsewhere." Mochuda replied--"In +this place I have desired to end my days. Here I have been many years +serving God and have almost reached the end of my life. Therefore I +shall not depart unless I am dragged hence by the hands against my will, +for it is not becoming an old man to abandon easily the place in which +he has spent great part of his life." Then the nobles returned to +Blathmac and they made various complaints of Mochuda, accusing him +falsely of many things; finally they asked the king to undertake the +expulsion personally, for they were themselves unequal to the task. The +king thereupon came to the place accompanied by a large retinue. +Alluding prophetically to the king's coming, previous to that event, +Mochuda said, addressing the monks:--"Beloved brothers, get ready and +gather your belongings, for violence and eviction are close at hand: the +chieftains of this land are about to expel and banish you from your own +home." Then the king, with his brothers and many of the chief men, +arrived on the scene. They encamped near Rahen and the king sent his +brother Diarmuid with some others to expel Mochuda and to put him out by +force--which Diarmuid pledged his word he should do. It was in the +choir at prayer that Diarmuid found Mochuda. Mochuda, though he knew +his mission, asked Diarmuid why he was come and what he sought. +Diarmuid replied that he came by order of King Blathmac to take him by +the hand and put him out of that establishment and to banish him from +Meath. "Do as you please," said Mochuda, "for we are prepared to +undergo all things for Christ's sake." "By my word," answered Diarmuid, +"I shall never be guilty of such a crime; let him who chooses do it." +Mochuda said:--"You shall possess the kingdom of God and you shall reign +in your brother's stead and your face which you have turned from me +shall never be turned from your enemies. Moreover the reproaches which +the king will presently cast upon you for not doing the work he has set +you, will be your praise and your pride. At the same time as a penalty +for your evil designs toward me and your greater readiness to drive me +out, your son shall not succeed you in the sovereignty." Diarmuid +returned to the king and told him that he could do no injury to Mochuda. +The king retorted [sarcastically and] in anger, "What a valiant man you +are, Diarmuid." Diarmuid replied:--"That is just what Mochuda promised +--that I should be a warrior of God." He was known as Diarmuid Ruanaidh +thenceforth, for the whole assembly cried out with one voice--truly he +is Valiant (Ruanaidh). + +Next, the nobles present cast lots to decide which one of them should go +with the king to lay hands on Mochuda and expel him from the monastery. +The lot fell upon the Herenach [hereditary steward] of Cluain Earaird. +He and the king accompanied by armed men went to the monastery where +they found Mochuda and all the brethren in the church. Cronan, a +certain rich man in the company, shouted out, "Make haste with the +business on which you are come." Mochuda answered him--"You shall die +immediately, but on account of the alms which you gave me for the love +of Christ and on account of your uniform piety heretofore your progeny +shall prosper for ever." That prophecy has been fulfilled. Another man, +Dulach by name, winked mockingly with one of his eyes; moreover he +laughed and behaved irreverently towards Mochuda. Mochuda said to him: +--"Thus shall you be--with one eye closed and a grin on your countenance +--to the end of your life; and of your descendants many will be similarly +afflicted." Yet another member of the company, one Cailche, +scurrilously abused and cursed Mochuda. To him Mochuda said:--"Dysentery +will attack you immediately and murrain that will cause your +death." The misfortune foretold befell him and indeed woeful misfortune +and ill luck pursued many of them for their part in the wrong doing. +When the king saw these things he became furious and, advancing--himself +and the abbot of Cluain Earaird--they took each a hand of Mochuda and in +a disrespectful, uncivil manner, they led him forth out of the monastery +while their followers did the same with Mochuda's community. Throughout +the city and in the country around there was among both sexes weeping, +mourning, and wailing over their humiliating expulsion from their own +home and monastery. Even amongst the soldiers of the king were many who +were moved to pity and compassion for Mochuda and his people. + +One of Mochuda's monks had gout in his foot and for him Mochuda besought +the king and his following that he, as he was unable to travel, might be +allowed to remain in the monastery; the request was, however, refused. +Mochuda called the monk to him and, in the name of Christ, he commanded +the pain to leave the foot and to betake itself to the foot of Colman +[Colman mac hua Telduib, abbot, or perhaps erenach only, of Cluain +Earaird], the chieftain who was most unrelenting towards him. That +soreness remained in Colman's foot as long as he lived. The monk +however rose up and walked and was able to proceed on his way with his +master. + +There was an aged monk who wished to be buried at Rahen; Mochuda granted +the request, and he received Holy Communion and sacred rites at the +saint's hands. Then he departed to heaven in the presence of all and +his body was buried at Rahen as he had himself chosen that it should be. + +Leaving Rahen Mochuda paid a visit to the monastic cemetery weeping as +he looked upon it; he blessed those interred there and prayed for them. +By the permission of God it happened that the grave of a long deceased +monk opened so that all saw it, and, putting his head out of the grave, +the tenant of the tomb cried out in a loud voice: "O holy man and +servant of God, bless us that through thy blessing we may rise and go +with you whither you go." Mochuda replied:--"So novel a thing I shall +not do, for it behoves not to raise so large a number of people before +the general resurrection." The monk asked--"Why then father, do you +leave us, though we have promised union with you in one place for ever?" +Mochuda answered:--"Brother, have you ever heard the proverb--'necessitas +movet decretum et consilium' (necessity is its own law)? Remain ye +therefore in your resting places and on the day of general resurrection +I shall come with all my brethren and we shall all assemble before the +great cross called 'Cross of the Angels' at the church door and go +together for judgement." When Mochuda had finished, the monk lay back in +his grave and the coffin closed. + +Mochuda, with his following, next visited the cross already mentioned +and here, turning to the king, he thus addressed him:--"Behold the +heavens above you and the earth below." The king looked at them: then +Mochuda continued:--"Heaven may you not possess and even from your +earthly principality may you soon be driven and your brother whom you +have reproached, because he would not lay hands on me, shall possess it +instead of you, and in your lifetime. You shall be despised by all--so +much so that in your brother's house they shall forget to supply you +with food. Moreover yourself and your children shall come to an evil +end and in a little while there shall not be one of your seed +remaining." Then Mochuda cursed him and he rang his small bell against +him and against his race, whence the bell has since been known as "The +Bell of Blathmac's Extinguishing," or "The Bell of Blathmac's Drowning," +because it drowned or extinguished Blathmac with his posterity. +Blathmac had a large family of sons and daughters but, owing to +Mochuda's curse, their race became extinct. Next to the prince of +Cluain Earaird who also had seized him by the hand, he said: "You shall +be a servant and a bondman ere you die and you shall lose your territory +and your race will be a servile one." To another of those who led him +by the hand he said:--"What moved you to drag me by the hand from my own +monastery?" The other replied:--"It pleased me not that a Munster man +should have such honour in Meath." "I wish," said Mochuda, "that the +hand you laid on me may be accursed and that the face you turned against +me to expel me from my home may be repulsive and scrofulous for the +remainder of your life." This curse was effective for the man's eye was +thereupon destroyed in his head. Mochuda noticed that some of +Columcille's successors and people from Durrow, which was one of +Columcille's foundations, had taken part in his eviction. He thus +addressed them:--"Contention and quarrelling shall be yours for ever to +work evil and schism amongst you--for you have had a prominent part in +exciting opposition to me." And so it fell out. + +The king and his people thereupon compelled Mochuda to proceed on his +way. Mochuda did proceed with his disciples, eight hundred and sixty +seven in number (and as many more they left buried in Rahen). Moreover, +many more living disciples of his who had lived in various parts of +Ireland were already dead. All the community abounded in grace: many +of its members became bishops and abbots in after years and they erected +many churches to the glory of God. + +Understand, moreover, that great was the charity of the holy bishop, as +the following fact will prove:--in a cell without the city of Rahen he +maintained in comfort and respectability a multitude of lepers. He +frequently visited them and ministered to them himself--entrusting that +office to no one else. It was known to all the lepers of Ireland how +Mochuda made their fellow-sufferers his special care and family, and the +result was that an immense number of lepers from all parts flocked to +him and he took charge and care of them. These on his departure from +Rahen he took with him to Lismore where he prepared suitable quarters +for them and there they have been ever since in comfort and in honour +according to Mochuda's command. + +As Mochuda and his people journeyed along with their vehicles they found +the way blocked by a large tree which lay across it. Owing to the +density of underwood at either side they were unable to proceed. Some +one announced:--"There is a tree across the road before us, so that we +cannot advance." Mochuda said: "In the name of Christ I command thee, +tree, to rise up and stand again in thy former place." At the command +of Mochuda the tree stood erect as it was originally and it still +retains its former appearance, and there is a pile of stones there at +its base to commemorate the miracle. + +It was necessary to proceed; the first night after Mochuda's departure +from Rahen the place that he came to was a cell called Drum Cuilinn +[Drumcullen], on the confines of Munster, Leinster, and Clanna Neill, +but actually within Clanna Neill, scil.:--in the territory of Fearceall +in which also is Rahen. In Drum Cuilinn dwelt the holy abbot, +Barrfhinn, renowned for miracles. On the morrow Mochuda arrived at +Saighir Chiarain [Seirkieran] and the following night at the +establishment where Cronan is now, scil.:--Roscrea. That night Mochuda +remained without entertainment although it was offered to them by Cronan +who had prepared supper for him. Mochuda refused however to go to it +saying that he would not go out of his way to visit a man who avoids +guests and builds his cell in a wild bog far from men and that such a +man's proper guests are creatures of the wilderness instead of human +beings. When Cronan heard this saying of Mochuda he came to the latter, +by whose advice he abandoned his hermitage in the bog and he, with +Mochuda, marked out the site of a new monastery and church at Roscrea. +There he founded a great establishment and there he is himself buried. +Mochuda took leave of Cronan and, travelling through Eile [Ely +O'Carroll], came to the royal city named Cashel. On the following day +the king, scil.:--Failbhe [Failbhe Flann], came to Mochuda offering him +a place whereon to found a church. Mochuda replied:--"It is not +permitted us by God to stay our journey anywhere till we come to the +place promised to us by the holy men." + +About the same time there came messengers from the king of Leinster to +the king of Munster praying the latter, by virtue of league and +alliance, to come to his assistance as Leath-Chuinn and the north were +advancing in great force to ravage Leinster. This is how Failbhe was +situated at the time: he had lost one of his eyes and he was ashamed to +go half-blind into a strange territory. As soon as Mochuda realised the +extent of the king's diffidence he blessed the eye making on it the sign +of the cross and it was immediately healed in the presence of all. The +king and Mochuda took leave of one another and went each his own way. +The king and his hosting went to the aid of Leinster in the latter's +necessity. + +Mochuda journeyed on through Muscraige Oirthir the chief of which +territory received him with great honour. Aodhan was the chief's name +and he bestowed his homestead called Isiol [Athassel] on Mochuda, who +blessed him and his seed. Next he came into the Decies. He travelled +through Magh Femin where he broke his journey at Ard Breanuinn +[Ardfinnan] on the bank of the Suir. There came to him here Maolochtair, +king of the Decies, and the other nobles [or one noble, Suibhne] of his +nation who were at variance with him concerning land. Mochuda by the +grace of God made peace amongst them, and dismissed them in amity. +Maolochtair gave that land to Mochuda who marked out a cell there where +is now the city of Ardfinnnan, attached to which is a large parish +subject to Mochuda and bearing his name. The wife of Maolochtair, +scil:--Cuciniceas, daughter of Failbhe Flann, king of Munster, had a +vision, viz.:--a flock of very beautiful birds flying above her head and +one bird was more beautiful and larger than the rest. The other birds +followed this one and it nestled in the king's bosom. Soon as she awoke +she related the vision to the king; the king observed: "Woman you have +dreamed a good dream and soon it will be realised; the flock of birds +you have seen is Mochuda with his monks coming from Rahen and the most +distinguished bird is Mochuda himself. And the settling in my bosom +means that the place of his resurrection will be in my territory. Many +blessings will come to us and our territory through him." That vision +of the faithful woman was realised as the faithful king had explained +it. + +Subsequently Mochuda came to Maolochtair requesting from him a place +where he might erect a monastery. Maolochtair replied: "So large a +community cannot dwell in such a narrow place." Mochuda said: "God, +who sent us to you, will show you a place suited to us." The king +answered:--"I have a place, convenient for fish and wood, beside Slieve +Gua on the bank of the Nemh but I fear it will not be large enough." +Mochuda said:--"It will not be narrow; there is a river and fish and +that it shall be the place of our resurrection." Thereupon, in +the presence of many witnesses, the king handed over the land, +scil.:--Lismore, to God and Mochuda and it is in that place Mochuda +afterwards founded his famous city. Mochuda blessed the king and his +wife as well as the nobles and all the people and taking leave of them +and receiving their homage he journeyed across Slieve Gua till he came to +the church called Ceall Clochair [Kilcloher]. The saint of that church, +scil.:--Mochua Mianain, prepared a supper for Mochuda to the best of his +ability, but he had only a single barrel of ale for them all. Although +Mochuda with his people remained there three days and three nights and +although the holy abbot (Mochua) continued to draw the ale into small +vessels to serve the company, according to their needs, the quantity in +the barrel grew no less but increased after the manner of the oil +blessed by Elias [3 Kings 17:16]. Then one of the monks said to +Mochuda, "If you remain in this place till the feast ends your stay will +be a long one for it (the entertainment) grows no smaller for all the +consumption." "That is true, brother," said Mochuda, "and it is fitting +for us to depart now." They started therefore on their way and Mochua +Mianain gave himself and his place to God and Mochuda for ever. On +Mochuda's departure the ale barrel drained out to the lees. + +Mochuda proceeded till he reached the river Nemh at a ford called +Ath-Mheadhon [Affane] which no one could cross except a swimmer or a very +strong person at low water in a dry season of summer heat, for the tide +flows against the stream far as Lismore, five miles further up. On this +particular occasion it happened to be high tide. The two first of +Mochuda's people to reach the ford were the monks Molua and Colman, +while Mochuda himself came last. They turned round to him and said that +it was not possible to cross the river till the ebb. Mochuda answered: +--"Advance through the water before the others in the name of your Lord +Jesus Christ for He is the way the truth and the life" [John 14:6]. As +soon as they heard this command of Mochuda's Molua said to Colman, +"Which of the two will you hold back--the stream above or the sea +below?" Colman answered:--"Let each restrain that which is nearest to +him"--for Molua was on the upper, or stream, side and Colman on the +lower, or sea, side. Molua said to Colman--"Forbid you the sea side to +flow naturally and I shall forbid the stream side." Then with great +faith they proceeded to cross the river; they signed the river with the +sign of Christ's cross and the waters stood on either hand and apart, so +that the dry earth appeared between. The side banks of water rose high +because there was no passage up or down, so that the ridges were very +elevated on both the sea and stream sides. The waters remained thus +till such time as all Mochuda's people had crossed. Mochuda himself was +the last to pass over and the path across was so level that it offered +no obstacle to foot-passengers or chariots but was like a level plain so +that they crossed dryshod, as the Jordan fell back for Josue the son of +Nun [Josue 3:17]. Soon as Mochuda had crossed over he blessed the waters +and commanded them to resume their natural course. On the reuniting +again of the waters they made a noise like thunder, and the name of the +place is The Place of Benedictions, from the blessings of Mochuda and +his people. + +Next the glorious bishop, Mochuda, proceeded to the place promised to +him by God and the prophets, which place is the plain called +Magh-Sciath. Mochuda, with the holy men, blessed the place and +dedicated there the site of a church in circular form. There came to +them a holy woman named Caimell who had a cell there and she asked, +"What do you propose doing here, ye servants of God?" "We propose," +answered Mochuda, "building here a little 'Lios' [enclosure] around our +possession." Caimell observed, "Not a little Lios will it be but a +great ['mor'] one (Lis-mor)." "True indeed, virgin," responded Mochuda, +"Lismore will be its name for ever." The virgin offered herself and her +cell to God and Mochuda for ever, where the convent of women is now +established in the city of Lismore. + +As Colman Elo, alluded to already, promised, Mochuda found his burial +place marked out (consecrated?) by angels; there he and a multitude of +his disciples are buried and it was made known to him by divine wisdom +the number of holy persons that to the end of the world would be buried +therein. Lismore is a renowned city, for there is one portion of it +which no woman may enter and there are within it many chapels and +monasteries, and in which there are always multitudes of devout people +not from Ireland alone but from the land of the Saxons and from Britain +and from other lands as well. This is its situation--on the south bank +of the Avonmore in the Decies territory. + +On a certain day there came a druid to Mochuda to argue and contend with +him. He said:--"If you be a servant of God cause natural fruit to grow +on this withered branch." Mochuda knew that it was to throw contempt on +the power of God that the druid had come. He blessed the branch and it +produced first living skin, then, as the druid had asked--leaves, +blossom and fruit in succession. The druid marvelled exceedingly and +went his way. + +A poor man came to Mochuda on another occasion with an ill timed request +for milk, and beer along with it. Mochuda was at the time close by the +well which is known as "Mochuda's Well" at the present time; this he +blessed changing it first into milk then into beer and finally to wine. +Then he told the poor man to take away whatever quantity of each of +these liquids he required. The well remained thus till at Mochuda's +prayer it returned to its original condition again. An angel came from +heaven to Mochuda at the time and told him that the well should remain a +source of health and virtues and of marvels, and it still, like every +well originally blessed by Mochuda, possesses power of healing from +every malady. + +Mochuda, now grown old and of failing powers and strength, was wearied +and worried by the incessant clamour of building operations--the +dressing of stones and timber--carried on by the multitude of monks and +artisans. He therefore by consent and counsel of the brethren retired +to a remote, lonely place situated in a glen called "Mochuda's Inch" +below the great monastery. He took with him there a few monks and built +a resplendent monastery; he remained in that place a year and six months +more leading a hermitical life. The brethren and seniors of the +community visited him (from time to time) and he gave them sound, +sweetly-reasoned advice. He received a vow from each to follow his +Rule, for he was the support of the aged, the health-giver to the weak, +the consoler of the afflicted, the hope-giver to the hopeless, the +faith-giver to the doubting, the moderator and uniter of the young. + +As soon as Mochuda saw the hardship to the visiting brothers and elders +of the descent from Lismore and the ascent thereto again--knowing at the +same time that his end was approaching--he ordered himself to be carried +up to the monastery so that the monks might be saved the fatigue of the +descent to him. Then it pleased God to call to Himself His devoted +servant from the troubles of life and to render to him the reward of his +good works. He opened the gates of heaven then and sent to him a host +of angels, in glory and majesty unspeakable. When Mochuda saw the +heavens open above him and the angel band approaching, he ordered that +he be set down in the middle of the glen and he related to the seniors +the things that he had seen and he asked to receive the Body of Christ +and he gave his last instruction to the monks--to observe the Law of God +and keep His commands. The place was by the cross called "Crux +Migrationis," or the cross from which Mochuda departed to Glory. Having +received the Body and Blood of Christ, having taught them divine +doctrines, in the midst of holy choirs and of many brethren and monks to +whom in turn he gave his blessing and the kiss of peace according to the +rule, the glorious and holy bishop departed to heaven accompanied by +hosts of angels on the day before the Ides of May [May 14], in his union +with the Holy Trinity--Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, for ever and ever. +Amen. + +Finit 7ber [September] 4th, 1741. + + + +NOTE 1 + +One of our scribe's predecessors omitted a word or two from the text +here, with disastrous results to the sense. The Latin Life comes to our +aid however and enables us to make good the omission; the latter, by +the way, puzzles our scribe who is like a man fighting an invisible +enemy--correcting a text of which he does not know the defect. Insertion +of the words "walking backwards" immediately after "church," in the +angel's answer, will enable us to see the original writer's meaning. The +text should probably read: + +The angel answered:--"Whom you shall see going from the church walking +backwards to the guest-house" (for it was Mochuda's custom to walk +backwards from the door of the church). Comghall announced to his +household that there was coming to them a distinguished stranger, +well-beloved of God, of whose advent an angel had twice foretold him. +Some time later Mochuda arrived at Comghall's establishment, and he went +to the monastery first and he did just as the angel foretold of him and +Comghall recognised him and bade him welcome. + + + +NOTE 2 + + +The obits of Mochuda's successors, down to Christian O'Conarchy, +are chronicled as follows:-- + +A.D. 650. Cuanan, maternal uncle and immediate successor of +Mochuda (Lanigan). +A.D. 698. Iarnla, surnamed Hierologus (Four Masters). In his +time King Alfrid was a student in Lismore. +A.D. 702. Colman, son of Finnbhar (Acta Sanctorum). During his +reign the abbey of Lismore reached the zenith of its fame. +A.D. 716. Cronan Ua Eoan (F. Masters). +A.D. 719. Colman O'Liathain (Annals of Inisfallen). +A.D. 741. Finghal (F. Masters). +A.D. 746. Mac hUige (Ibid). +A.D. 747. Ihrichmech (A. of Inisf.) +A.D. 748. Maccoigeth (F. M.) +A.D. 752. Sinchu (F. M.) +A.D. 755. Condath (Ibid). +A.D. 756. Fincon (Annals of Ulster). +A.D. 761. Aedhan (F. M.) +A.D. 763. Ronan (Ware). +A.D. 769. Soairleach Ua Concuarain (F. M.) +A.D. 771. Eoghan (Ibid). +A.D. 776. Orach (Ibid). +A.D. 799. Carabran (Ibid). +A.D. 801. Aedhan Ua Raichlich (A. of Inisf.) +A.D. 823. Flann (F. M.) +A.D. 849. Tibrade Ua Baethlanaigh (F. M.) At this period the +town was plundered and burned by the Danes who had sailed up +thither on the Blackwater. +A.D. 849. Daniel (A. of Inisf.) +A.D. 854. Suibne Ua Roichlech (F. M. and A. of Ulster). What is +probably his gravestone is one of five Irish-inscribed slabs +built into the west gable of the Cathedral. +A.D. 861. Daniel Ua Liaithidhe (F. M.) +A.D. 878. Martin Ua Roichligh (Ibid). Another of the inscribed +stones above referred to asks "A prayer for Martan." +A.D. 880. Flann Mac Forbasaich (A. I.) +A.D. 899. Maelbrighte Mac Maeldomnaich (Ibid). +A.D. 918. Cormac Mac Cuilennan (A. I.) He is to be +distinguished from his more famous namesake of Cashel. +A.D. 936. Ciaran (F. M.) +A.D. 951. Diarmuid (Ibid). +A.D. 957. Maenach Mac Cormaic (Ibid). +A.D. 958. Cathmog (Ibid). He was also bishop of Cork. +A.D. 963. Cinaedh (F. M.) +A.D. 1025. Omaelsluaig (Cotton's "Fasti"). +A.D. 1034. Moriertach O'Selbach, bishop of Lismore (Cotton). +A.D. 1064. Mac Airthir, bishop (Cotton). +A.D. 1090. Maelduin O'Rebhacain (Ibid). +A.D. 1112. Gilla Mochuda O'Rebhacain (A. of I.) +A.D. 1113. Nial Macgettigan. His episcopal staff, possibly +enclosing the venerable oaken staff of the founder of the abbey, +is still preserved at Lismore Castle. [Also known as the +'Lismore Crozier,' in 2004 it is housed in 'The Treasury' exhibit +at the National Museum of Ireland, Kildare St., Dublin 2.] +A.D. 1134. Malchus. Most probably he is identical with the +first bishop of Waterford. During his term both St. Malachy and +King Cormac MacCarthy dwelt as fugitives, guests or pilgrims, at +Lismore. +A.D. 1142. Ua Rebhacain. +A.D. 1186. St. Christian. He had however resigned the +bishopric. + + + + +TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE + + +The source for this text includes the Irish text and English translation +on facing pages and notes. The notes are quite lengthy and should take +longer to transcribe than the English text. Except for a few notes +transplanted in brackets to the body of the text I have not transcribed +them. Due to inexperience with the Irish language and its script I have +decided not to attempt to transcribe the Irish text. Hopefully someone +with the appropriate talent and interest will undertake that task some +day. I have corrected the errata as indicated in the source and a few +obvious printer errors. Please note that this text contains variant +spellings of names and words sometimes inconsistently applied. + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Lives of SS. Declan and Mochuda, Anonymous + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LIVES OF SS. DECLAN AND MOCHUDA *** + +***** This file should be named 11168.txt or 11168.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/1/1/6/11168/ + +Produced by Dennis McCarthy + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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